


Roughin' It

by Rosie2009



Series: Descendants Fanfiction [46]
Category: Descendants (Disney Movies), Disney - All Media Types
Genre: F/M, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-12
Updated: 2020-07-30
Packaged: 2021-03-01 22:15:46
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 15
Words: 42,578
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23604409
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Rosie2009/pseuds/Rosie2009
Summary: After Uma boldly and perhaps stupidly proclaims that she could handle camping easily, Mal, Evie, Audrey, Jane, and Uma end up on a camping trip that none of them were prepared for in the least. Friendship feels amongst all three girls, Huma, Jarlos, Jaudrey, Bal, and Hades father/daughter feels with Mal.
Relationships: Audrey Rose & Uma (Disney), Ben/Mal (Disney: Descendants), Evie & Audrey Rose (Disney), Evie & Jane & Mal & Audrey Rose & Uma (Disney), Evie & Jane (Disney: Descendants), Evie & Mal (Disney), Evie & Uma (Disney), Gil & Uma (Disney: Descendants), Hades & Mal (Disney), Harry Hook/Uma, Jane & Audrey Rose (Disney: Descendants), Jane & Mal (Disney: Descendants), Jane & Uma (Disney: Descendants), Jane/Carlos de Vil, Jay/Audrey Rose (Disney), Mal & Audrey Rose (Disney), Mal & Uma (Disney)
Series: Descendants Fanfiction [46]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1252532
Comments: 20
Kudos: 57





	1. The Challenge

“I could do that with one hand tied behind my back,” Uma commented, pointing at the television screen showing a hardly clothed man starting a fire from her position on the opposite side of the couch to Mal and Evie snuggled together.

Currently, Uma, Mal, Evie, Audrey, and Jane were all crowded around Mal’s television watching the latest episode of _Bare and Scared_. Audrey was in the middle of painting her nails, and Jane was watching in horror whenever someone’s naked rear end happened to show on-screen. Mal and Evie were cuddled closely on one end of the sofa, and Evie was playing with Mal’s hair gently as they watched the television.

Everyone was peaceful. That is, except for Uma who had been constantly poking fun at the people participating in the games, constantly claiming that she could do better than them.

“You might be from the Isle, but that doesn’t automatically make you a survival wizard,” Audrey remarked somewhat snidely as she looked over at Uma. No one could blame her for her unimpressed responses to Uma. After all, the girl had been seriously interrupting their ability to watch the show.

“How do you know? You didn’t live through what I did,” Uma told her with a scoff, sending a dismissive gesture in the direction of the pink princess as she dedicated the majority of her attentions to the television.

“Well, I don’t think Evie could do all of those things,” Audrey proclaimed, and Evie looked in Audrey’s direction, pausing in her stroking of Mal’s head as she watched the exchange between the other two girls. Mal looked up at her unappreciatively, and Evie just offered her sister a soft smile before continuing in her ministrations. However, she kept her eyes on Uma and Audrey since she was honestly curious about what Uma would respond with.

“That’s because Evie was mooching off of Mal and her protection,” Uma told Audrey with a smirk, managing to successfully combat Audrey and insult Evie all in one sentence. Evie’s eyes narrowed in slight disapproval, but ultimately she decided to ignore Uma.

“Mal, was it that bad over there?” Audrey asked, and Mal shifted her gaze over to Audrey lazily as Evie scratched her fingernails against Mal’s scalp gently.

“It certainly wasn’t great over there,” Mal commented, and Uma shot Audrey a victorious glance. Audrey just looked between the both of them skeptically for a moment before rolling her eyes.

“Personally, I think camping like that is for barbarians,” Audrey voiced her opinions, choosing to take a different route now that Uma and Mal had completely nixed her attempts at proving the pirate wrong.

“Personally, I think camping like that is for the truly tough,” Uma mimicked, and Audrey raised a perfectly manicured brow in the midst of her unimpressed emotions.

“Oh, please, you couldn’t do it,” Audrey told Uma with a scoff, painting her pinkie fingernail on her right hand.

“Speak for yourself,” Uma replied, stretching her arms as she relaxed against the couch.

“I think I’d like to camp,” Jane spoke timidly, throwing in her opinion.

“Why would you ever want to go camping? Don’t you know there’s bears in the woods?” Audrey asked, and Jane looked somewhat fearful for a moment before gaining more confidence.

“Well, Mal can turn into a dragon. I’d like to camp if Mal was going to be there,” Jane piped up, and Mal raised an eyebrow, unimpressed.

“Yeah, but she can’t protect you from bugs,” Audrey pointed out.

“That’s what bug spray’s for,” Evie added unhelpfully, lifting a finger as she offered her input. Audrey shot her a glare, and turned back to Jane, trying to convince the fairy to give up the idea of camping.

“Jane, you have to sleep on the ground,” Audrey explained, and Uma rolled her eyes.

“Well, you’d have a tent, princess. It ain’t like your royal butt’s going to be touching the dirt,” Uma told Audrey, and Audrey narrowed her eyes.

“It’s close enough. And do you really think that bugs can’t crawl through the canvas?” Audrey asked, and Uma just scoffed.

“That is gross, but I think it’s largely an inaccurate assumption,” Evie spoke, petting Mal’s hair affectionately as she engaged in the conversation. “However, no electricity is worrisome because that means no showers or baths.”

“Especially the no shower part is concerning. Have you smelled Uma after a few days without a bath?” Mal questioned, shooting Uma a mischievous glance, and the pirate offered her a smile full of fake sugary sweetness.

“Like you and Blue over there don’t get a good stink rolling by day three sans shower,” Uma retorted, and Evie actually appeared genuinely offended by the insinuation as she subtly sniffed her shirt. Mal raised an eyebrow at the bluenette, knowing that Evie took a shower every day.

Audrey cleared her throat, pulling the discussion’s focus back onto her instead of the rather disgusting tack that they had all wavered over to.

“Look, what I’m saying is that we can’t make it outdoors,” Audrey stated, and she carefully painted her thumbnail of her right hand.

“Yes, I could,” Uma stubbornly argued, and Audrey huffed in response, looking Uma over as she skeptically considered the pirate’s statement. Uma pursed her lips before raising up in her seat and glancing at the lot of them.

“Heck, you know what? I’m going to go camping,” Uma told the girls, and Audrey actually burst into laughter in response to her bold proclamation. Uma narrowed her eyes at the other girl unappreciatively, and Audrey just kept up her mirth at Uma’s expense.

“I’m serious!”

“Oh, I’m sure you are. Right until you’re mauled by wild animals,” Audrey giggled, shaking her head at the pirate as she picked up where she had left off on her Uma set her jaw and glared at the princess.

“I’ll be just fine. And I’ll bet some of these other girls around here’d like to prove their toughness, too,” Uma boldly proclaimed, looking at Evie, Mal, and Jane expectantly. Evie just offered Uma a sweet, somewhat guilty grin.

“I don’t think I really want to go out in the woods, Uma. I think I had my fill of roughing it for a little while,” Evie expressed, remembering the insane misadventures that they had when they visited a farm not too long ago.

“Oh, come on. You enjoyed playing in the pig pen and hanging out with your goose boyfriend, didn’t you?” Uma questioned teasingly, her eyes gleaming with that characteristic wickedness. Evie just shook her head and looked at Uma with a calm expression.

“I enjoyed that as much as you enjoyed being chased by a runaway donkey,” Evie pointed out, and Uma quickly decided to let Evie off the hook and avoid picking on her. Uma looked to Jane hopefully, and the girl just shrugged. Uma then turned her attentions to Mal.

“C’mon, Mal. Let’s go out and show this princess that we’re the queens,” Uma looked at the faerie pleadingly, and Mal eyed her for a moment. Mal considered this idea quietly and she then sat up and hesitantly pulled away from Evie’s warm embrace in order to better speak to Uma.

“Sure. That sounds fun,” Mal agreed easily, and Uma grinned victoriously at the pink princess. Evie narrowed her eyes, looking between Uma and Mal with something that greatly resembled jealousy.

“Well, I’m coming, too! M’s not going with you by herself,” Evie proclaimed somewhat childishly, and Mal just reached back to fondly hug Evie, reassuring the girl that Mal would never think of replacing her only sister.

“You make it out like I’m trying to take her from you or something,” Uma commented, and Evie just glared at the pirate silently.

“Trust me, you can have her. I sure don’t want her,” Uma told Evie with a laugh. Mal just rolled her eyes at the both of them, knowing that Evie had been having issues trusting Uma to not replace her since Evie and Uma had pulled that prank on April Fool’s and Uma had gotten so snuggly with Mal in an attempt to bewilder the faerie.

Evie just eyed Uma with a slight glare but was soon interrupted by Jane speaking up.

“I think I’d like to go since Mal’s going. I know I’ll be safe with her there,” Jane confidently expressed, and Uma clasped her hands with an audible clap.

“Alright. So, it’s settled,” Uma grinned widely, and Audrey just stared in irritation at the lot of them before groaning loudly.

“Ugh! I cannot believe that I’m seriously doing this!” Audrey growled before blowing on her nails and sitting down the polish container, screwing the top back on it carefully.

“I guess I’ll go with you guys. Jay’s going to tease me relentlessly if he finds out that you guys are going camping and I refused to go on account of my ‘girliness,’” Audrey air-quoted the word, obviously referencing Jay’s own phrasing surrounding his girlfriend.

Uma smiled at the lot of them in a positively wicked manner.

“Alright… Where are we going?” Uma questioned, looking at the group, and Evie shrugged, having no idea where they could camp as she rested her head against Mal’s affectionately. Jane furrowed her brow before her face lit up.

“We could camp by the Enchanted Lake!” Jane offered, and Uma scoffed.

“That’s way too close to home, and it’s nothing like serious camping which is far from civilization,” Uma told the daughter of the Fairy Godmother. Jane pursed her lips, trying to think of another location. Mal raised an eyebrow, honestly believing that Jane’s suggestion wasn’t such a bad idea but also understanding Uma’s point of view surrounding the subject as well.

“Well, there’s this super remote area in Auroria, and it should be a good place to camp,” Audrey told Uma carefully after considering their options for a long moment.

“Alright, then. It’s settled. We’ll head out as soon as we get packed, let the boys know, and get a good night’s rest,” Uma spoke, standing up and heading out of the room as she presumably left to pack up her clothes.

“We’re going to need tents and food supplies,” Evie spoke, and Audrey rolled her eyes at the bluenette as she started to arise from her seated position.

“I’m sure Mal can send one of the servants on an errand to go get some,” Audrey told Evie, and Mal nodded easily. Audrey nodded resolutely, starting toward the door but pausing just before she reached it.

“Jane, I’m going to need you to come with me. I can’t open doors. It’ll mess up my fingernails, Audrey spoke, and Jane nodded, following the princess and letting her out of the room. She soon shut the door behind her, leaving Mal and Evie in the room by themselves.

As soon as they left, Mal dove for the remote, turning off the television quickly. Evie furrowed her brow, eyeing Mal strangely as she tried to figure out Mal’s reasons for shutting off the show.

Mal looked at Evie for a moment before shaking her head.

“I needed to turn that crap off before anyone else came up with any more bright ideas,” Mal expressed and Evie just chuckled in response, wrapping an arm around the purple-haired girl and pressing her cheek against Mal’s forehead.

Somehow beyond anyone’s understanding, they were about to be off on another of their infamous trips that had become simultaneously so frustrating and so quintessential to their relationship as a group.

Undoubtedly, they were in for a serious adventure.


	2. Heading Out

“So, me and the guys decided we’re going camping, too,” Jay proclaimed as he and the other boys hauled the girls’ luggage to the back of Evie’s Jeep. Audrey raised an eyebrow as she eyed her boyfriend skeptically.

They were all getting ready to leave, and Mal and Evie were currently talking to Ben and Hades as they walked them out to Evie’s cursed Jeep Charlene. Ben had Evie and Mal’s suitcases in his hands while Hades walked along free-handed. Jane was in deep conversation with Carlos as they discussed the preparations for camping. Carlos was clutching her suitcase closely to him as if it were about to run away from him.

“Where are you camping?” Audrey asked finally, and Jay almost visibly puffed up in pride as he leaned in a bit closer to her. Against her will, Audrey’s heart fluttered a bit in response to his nearness.

“Out by the Enchanted Lake,” Jay proudly declared, and Uma snorted as she walked by, Harry and Gil quick at her heels as Harry leaned in front of the pink princess to throw in Uma’s luggage. Audrey leaned away from him, moving into Jay’s chest as she evaded Harry’s arm.

Harry just raised an eyebrow at Audrey with a slight smirk as he pulled back and rejoined Uma. Audrey suddenly felt Jay’s hand on her waist, and as cute as it was that Jay was jealous, Audrey knew that Harry didn’t mean anything by it as he looked so reverent of Uma at this moment.

“That’s for little girls,” Uma told him with a joyful laugh, and Jay furrowed his brow in slight offense to her statement. Audrey smiled, enjoying Uma’s jabs at the boys. So often, the guys enjoyed aggravating and getting a rise out of the girls, but it was nice to finally have an opportunity to give it back to them.

“I thought twasn’t so bad,” Harry admitted, narrowing his eyes as he stared at Uma carefully. Uma just grinned at him, rolling her eyes as she patted his chest affectionately.

“I honestly thought you two were better than this. Pansy wasn’t in your applications for the slots of first mate and prized barnacle,” Uma pointed out as she leaned against the Jeep door.

“Ooh! I get to be prized barnacle?! I thought that was CJ’s job,” Gil piped up, and Uma just rolled her eyes at him fondly as Harry stepped closer to her, his torso not quite touching her body.

“Oh, come, Cap’n. The Enchanted Lake isn’t that close to the castle,” Harry spoke, and Uma leaned in nearer to him, teasing him unashamedly as she almost let her lips touch his own before she pulled back. At this point, Gil was being completely ignored.

“Well, yeah. If you take the long way on the established road instead of just stepping out into the backyard,” Uma replied, and Harry looked at her pleadingly.

Deciding to throw him a bone, Uma locked eyes with him and leaned forward, delivering a soft kiss to his lips before nibbling his bottom lip slightly. She then swiftly pulled away as she watched him with that strong love that she so rarely allowed to show in her eyes.

“Speaking of that, you girls make sure you text or call every night so we know you’re okay out there,” Hades told them, and Uma suddenly realized that the rest of the group was closer than she had originally anticipated. Uma quickly reined in that look of unbridled affection in hopes that no one but Harry or perhaps Gil had seen it.

However, if Audrey’s smile was anything to go by, the princess had definitely seen it as well.

“Don’t be such a worrywart, Dad,” Mal told him dismissively and rolled her eyes. Evie raised an eyebrow at Mal fondly, knowing that the girl was independent at heart but also knowing that peace of mind for the people that cared about the faerie was important as well.

“Oh, I’m not worrying. I just want to get status updates so I know you’re kicking Florian’s butt when they go out,” Hades spoke, and Ben winced a bit at the use of his last name. Evie chuckled underneath her breath, noting just how alike that Hades and Mal were in their deflections of their true feelings of concern. Mal sighed deeply, but finally nodded, agreeing with Hades.

“I’ll text,” Mal told him begrudgingly, and he nodded before reaching out and pulling her to him, embracing her lovingly. Mal smiled, resting her head against his shoulder and Evie felt her heart swell for her sister.

Evie then, sensing that it was time to go, turned to Ben and opened her arms. He eyed her affectionately before reciprocating her embrace fondly. After a moment, Mal and Evie then traded guys.

“Are you sure you can handle camping?” Mal asked Ben as he pressed his forehead against her own and placed his hands on her waist.

“Of course. I think I’m pretty well-equipped to handle the outdoors,” Ben confidently spoke, and Mal chuckled underneath her breath before pressing her nose against his own.

“I don’t believe a word of it, but your confidence is cute,” Mal told him before locking lips with him firmly. He moved a hand up so that he was cradling the back of her head, and she reached up, wrapping her arms around his neck as she pulled him closer.

However, with Evie and Hades, a much different conversation was occurring.

“Keep an eye on her, okay?” Hades whispered as soon as Evie was in his arms. Evie nodded, smiling as she squeezed him a bit.

“I will,” Evie promised carefully, knowing it made the god happy to hear that Evie was taking care of Mal. She was one of the few people that Hades trusted with the job.

“And don’t tell her I told you to,” Hades murmured, and Evie just laughed before releasing him.

The two just stared at Ben and Mal kissing for a moment before Hades narrowed his eyes, reaching forward and grabbing Ben’s collar as he yanked him backwards.

“Alright, lover boy, that’s enough. She’s still my daughter,” Hades warned him carefully, and Ben nodded quickly in understanding, stepping back so that he was a bit away from Mal. Mal just smirked at the both of them, simultaneously enjoying her dad’s protectiveness and her husband’s uncomfortableness.

The two girls then headed over to Carlos and Jay to wish them a goodbye.

“Alright, you two girls have fun on your glamping trip,” Mal told Jay as she hugged him tightly. Jay narrowed his eyes, and Mal chuckled under her breath, sensing the rise that she was about to earn from the two boys.

“We are not glamping!” Carlos protested, and Evie grinned widely as she embraced Carlos.

“It is serious business!” Jay emphatically proclaimed, and the two girls switched guys once again as they had earlier.

“We are manly men!” Carlos exclaimed, and Mal pulled away after a moment to ruffle his hair affectionately.

“Okay, Snowflake,” Evie agreed if only to make them stop arguing, and Mal flashed them a smirk.

“That was too easy of an agreement,” Jay pointed out, and Mal rolled her eyes at them as she started toward the car with Evie.

“If we kept arguing with you about this, we’d be here until you guys actually manned up and went to really camp,” Mal jabbed, and Evie couldn’t help but chuckle at their brothers’ expense.

Evie went around to the driver’s seat and Mal started to get into the passenger side in the front of Charlene. Uma offered Harry and Gil a swift hug before sliding into the car and across to her place just behind Evie.

Audrey was just about to enter the vehicle when Jay caught her wrist and pulled her so that her back was pressed against his chest. The corners of her lips curled into a smile as his lips touched just behind her ear. Audrey turned her head so that she could meet his lips in a sweet kiss. She immediately felt his hands wandering her sides and drifting to her hips until she grabbed them in her own hands.

“Behave,” Audrey mumbled against his lips, not making perfect coherence but ensuring that her voice was strong enough for him to understand to stop. She felt more than saw his smirk, but his hands quickly returned where they belonged.

Audrey then pulled away from him, forcing herself to come out of the pleasantly overwhelming sensation of her lips lighting on fire. She grinned, offering him a scorching onceover before sliding into the car.

Carlos wasted no time in embracing Jane tightly, and he moved to kiss her cheek gently, but she happened to move her face so she could kiss his cheek as well at the same time and they tentatively touched lips. Both of them were very surprised, and after a moment of their lips brushing, Carlos pulled away.

The pair were each sporting bright blushes, and Jane felt her stomach doing flips as she realized that this was probably the first time that they had actually ever kissed on the lips. The boy smiled slightly, and she couldn’t help but allow an enormous, silly grin to cover her face.

They looked at each other quietly for a moment, really not knowing what to say.

“C’mon, Jane,” Audrey spoke up finally, and Jane looked back at the princess quickly, suddenly remembering that there were others present outside of just her and Carlos. Audrey was smiling widely at the fairy and she ultimately looked very pleased. Jane blushed even harder if possible and Audrey gently patted the seat where Jane had her place behind Mal.

Jane returned her gaze to Carlos, offering him a small wave and a bashful grin before getting into the Jeep and pulling the door shut behind her.

“Love you, Dad! Love you, Ben!” Mal called as Evie cranked the Jeep.

“Love you, hon!” Ben called, and Hades just rolled his eyes at the boy before calling a goodbye to his daughter.

“We love you guys!” Evie called to Jay and Carlos and they all hooted in response to the girl.

“Y’all mind your manners and hey! Don’t rough it too much,” Uma called out with a wicked cackle.

Evie then started to drive out, everyone calling out goodbyes.

When they reached the end of the driveway, Evie withdrew a map, handing it to Mal before turning out onto the road.

“Alright, M, you are my star navigator,” Evie dubbed. Mal started trying to unfold the ridiculously tucked, giant map, and Uma raised an eyebrow as she leaned forward to look at the two girls in the front seat.

“So, why does she get to be star navigator? You are aware I’m a ship captain, aren’t you?” Uma asked, and Evie opened her mouth, about to provide an explanation before Mal quickly interrupted.

“Because I’m her favorite,” Mal piped up, smiling at Evie sweetly, and the bluenette didn’t even bother denying it as she simply grinned in response.

“I find that exceedingly biased,” Uma commented, and Audrey scoffed in reply to the pirate.

“As if you’re not the most biased human being on the planet,” Audrey smirked, and Uma furrowed her brow as she turned to face the princess.

“I don’t recall pulling your string,” Uma spoke before the both of them started into their usual bickering.

And they were off to engage in one of their most insane escapades yet.


	3. Setting Up

“QUIT IT, UMA!!!”

“I’m not doing anything, princess!”

“YOU’RE TOUCHING ME!!!”

“I’m not touching!”

“YOU’RE TOUCHING!!!”

“Not touching!”

“Don’t make me reach back there, you two!” Evie suddenly yelled, interrupting the both of them as she pointed at the two from her position in the driver’s seat. Mal groaned deeply as Uma and Audrey just ploughed right through Evie’s warnings, continuing in their yelling and fussing as Jane shrunk away from their fight.

They all were very much suffering the effects of being so tightly crammed in Evie’s Jeep Charlene like sardines with their luggage piled high in the back to the point that it almost overflowed into the backseat where Uma, Audrey, and Jane were currently seated.

Mal herself did not mind the cramped atmosphere in the least. She enjoyed spending time with the five of the girls, as sappy as it may have sounded.

However, what she did mind was the fact that Audrey and Uma had not stopped arguing and aggravating one another since Audrey had thought it was a good idea to point out Uma’s obvious bias in certain situations.

“Why did I even agree to go with you people on another trip in the first place?!” Audrey demanded in exasperation, and Uma’s face lit up in a positively wicked smile as she leaned toward the pink princess from her position behind Evie’s driver seat.

“’Cause you love us!” Uma told her, putting her nose against that of Audrey’s and Audrey leaned away swiftly in an attempt to escape Uma’s aggravation.

“I don’t love _you_!” Audrey emphatically proclaimed, and Uma just kept following the other girl with that same mischievous expression playing across her lips as she fully enjoyed pestering the princess.

“You love me!”

“I don’t!”

“You do!” Uma teased, and Mal watched as Evie’s patience was wearing extremely thin.

“What gave you the slightest idea that I’m even remotely attached to you?!”

“Well, you agreed to go on this trip with me!”

“Only because I knew what Jay would do!” After only a moment more of this perpetual dispute, Evie’s patience quickly expired completely. Evie slowed the car down as they traversed this small worn trail in the middle of the forest, and she reached to her foot, withdrawing a blue flat.

“Okay, you two are lucky I’m not wearing heels today!” Evie cried before swinging the shoe wildly and nearly hitting Mal in the process.

“Woah, E, watch it!” Mal yelped as Evie kept her eyes on the road and tried to hit the two troublemakers with her flat.

“Evie and Jane are sweet, Mal’s okay, but you’re absolutely awful!” Audrey announced as Uma grabbed Audrey’s head in the crook of her arm, trying to lock her in a chokehold. Mal furrowed her brow as she glared at Audrey the best she could.

“I take offense to that!” Mal told the princess as she held her hands out defensively against Evie’s wild fire.

“What do you think you are then, princess?!” Uma demanded with an evil laugh, and Evie kept swinging her shoe. Finally, the bluenette found purchase against Jane’s leg.

“OW! You hit me,” Jane whimpered, and Evie flashed Jane an apologetic look before she tried to reach more directly behind her.

“I’m sorry, sweetie, can you pull Uma more into my line of fire?” Evie questioned, and Mal almost snorted at her best friend.

Evie finally managed to hit Audrey in the head, and Audrey screeched in response, Uma jumping backwards and releasing Audrey in order to evade the shoe. Uma just laughed at the utterly disturbed and offended expression on Audrey’s face.

“Evie, you better put that thing back where it came from, or so help me---”

“Look, if you two in the back weren’t making so much noise, she wouldn’t have to do that!” Mal piped up, throwing her opinion in the mix. Uma leaned against the window, and Audrey rolled her eyes with a growl underneath her breath as she shot Uma a disdainful glare.

Evie withdrew her shoe and sat it in the floorboard before returning her eyes to the road.

“How long have we been on this pig trail?” Uma questioned, and Mal sighed as she looked at the map that Evie had unfurled and thrown into her lap earlier.

“Too long. But we should approach a gate soon.”

“Well, presuming that you haven’t been reading the map upside down, Miss Star-Girl,” Uma jabbed, referencing Evie’s title of star navigator, and Mal just chose to ignore the pirate in order to avoid giving her the satisfaction of a response.

“Hey, my star came through,” Evie spoke suddenly, interrupting Uma, and Evie reached over to Mal’s hand, squeezing it as they all beheld the metal gate before them that would let them into the deep forest. Mal beamed at Evie before looking back at Uma with narrowed eyes and a smirk. Uma’s nostrils flared a bit as she realized that Mal had won this round.

“It’s kind of creepy, isn’t it?” Jane pointed out after a few beats of silence. Evie, Mal, and Audrey nodded silently in agreement, but Uma just clicked her tongue unhappily as she glanced at the others.

“Good grief. You four are a pocket full of posies.”

“What?” Audrey asked, a slight chuckle in her voice as she eyed Uma disbelievingly. The princess honestly wasn’t sure what that insult was supposed to mean.

“Yeah, it was the best I could come up with on short notice,” Uma waved her away dismissively. “You know what I mean, though. Y’all are soft.”

Evie flashed Uma a slight glance of disapproval, and Mal just rolled her eyes heavily.

“Well, if you’re so brave, get out there and open it yourself,” Audrey proclaimed, and Mal could hear some odd edge to the princess’s voice that caught the faerie’s attention. Uma stared Audrey down for a moment before unbuckling her seat belt effortlessly.

“Pfft, fine. Lazy,” Uma murmured under her breath as she opened the door and slid out, shutting the car door behind her. The girls watched as Uma reached the gate, fiddling with the padlock.

“Evie, quick, lock the doors!” Audrey commanded in a whisper-yell, and Evie looked at Audrey quizzically. Mal grinned widely as she eyed Uma wickedly, now knowing exactly why Audrey had sounded so strange earlier.

“Why?”

“C’mon, she’s been constantly unpeaceable since we first left!” Audrey pleaded, and Evie furrowed her brow, pursing her lips as she seriously considered this idea. Evie looked to Mal with some concern in her eyes, and Mal nodded wholeheartedly, encouraging the bluenette to lock the pirate out.

Evie sighed but finally moved her finger over to the lockdown button, clicking it quickly before Uma came back. Audrey smiled evilly before high-fiving Mal.

They all watched attentively as Uma finally pulled the gate wide open so Evie could drive through. She then walked back to the Jeep with that usual swaggering gait. There was almost a collective holding of breaths as Uma reached for the door handle, aiming to pull the door open.

However, the door wouldn’t budge, despite how Uma yanked. After only a moment, it seemed to occur to the pirate that the girls had locked her out of the vehicle.

“What the--- let me in!” Uma cried, smacking the window with the palm of her hand as she glared in at Audrey. Mal and Audrey quickly burst into laughter, greatly enjoying their prank. Jane was just watching them, a slight smile on her face as she somewhat savored the joke. Even Evie, despite her original trepidation, was grinning widely and chuckling a bit.

“This is not funny! You let me back right now!” Uma yelled outside the door, growing more and more irritated.

“Hey, what if we drove to the campsite and let Uma walk?” Audrey called somewhat loudly so that Uma could hear as the pink princess turned to look at Mal. It truly wouldn’t have been that much of a walk, because according to Mal’s map, they were only about a half-mile away from the area where they would camp. Mal shrugged noncommittally, and Uma snarled, baring her teeth a little as she moved to Evie’s window.

“Let me in, Evie!” Uma demanded, and they all simply giggled in response to her, enjoying their payback delivered to Uma after all of the pirate’s troublesome behavior on the trip.

“Okay, guys, we should probably let her in.”

“Open the back!” Mal suddenly suggested quietly, and Audrey nodded her head swiftly. “She’ll love that! Remember Halloween?”

Indeed, everyone remembered precisely how things went at Halloween and how much Uma had fussed about having to ride in the rear compartment of Charlene. Even if it had been for only a moment.

Evie pursed her lips before looking back at Uma with only a hint of apology in her gaze and mostly a smirk as she opened the back of the Jeep. Uma furrowed her brow as she looked in the direction of the rear compartment. It soon dawned upon her precisely what Evie had done, and she turned back to the bluenette, her eyes narrowed in frustration and her jaw set.

“Aw, heck, no, y’all ain’t doing this to me again!” Uma proclaimed, and all of the girls just jutted a thumb behind them as they grinned hugely. Uma growled under her breath before stomping off in the direction of the back. Mal just laughed wholeheartedly, Audrey giggling like a madwoman in the back along with the faerie. Evie smiled widely as she looked at her best friend, proud of the fact that she had brought so much joy to Mal even if it was rather mischievous.

They all heard the back of the Jeep just barely close, and Audrey suddenly squealed as Uma began trying to clamber over the luggage. Evie slowly started to drive once again as Audrey pushed at the suitcases and camping paraphernalia that was about to avalanche along with a pirate.

Finally, Uma managed to get past Audrey’s attempts at blockading, and she fell down into the seat on top of Audrey. Uma then proceeded to hold the girl down the best that she could so that she could dangle a fresh wad of spit over the girl’s face.

“OH, STOP, UMA, STOP!!! EWWW!!!” Audrey screeched, and Uma was barely holding in her laughs as she had the princess bent to her will at this very moment. Uma finally settled for just leaning down and licking her swiftly. Audrey screamed in response loudly, Uma sitting on top of her as she cackled at Audrey.

“You know, I’m honestly not sure if this was a good idea. They’re louder now than before,” Evie spoke, and Mal snorted, completely cracking up over the show in the backseat.

Uma then moved so that she was off of Audrey’s body in favor of sticking her finger inside of her mouth and making sure it was good and wet. Mal’s eyes widened as Uma’s hand suddenly headed straight toward an unknowing Evie’s ear.

As soon as it was inside of Evie’s ear, the bluenette yelped, trying desperately to pry Uma’s finger away from her. Uma allowed her to--- after all, the damage was done--- and she was laughing all the while as Evie whimpered and whined about gooey ears. Mal couldn’t help but laugh as well, and Evie shot her a somewhat betrayed and exasperated glare.

“That is so disgusting! M, reach behind my seat and get a paper towel!” Evie cried, and Mal, chuckling all the way, took out the paper towels and ripped one from the roll.

Evie furiously wiped at the inside of her ear as she went down the road and approached nearer to the campsite.

“Hey, Blue, look at the bright side.”

“Is there one?” Evie dared to question, knowing that Uma was likely going somewhere with this, but not quite of the ability to take defensive action at this moment.

“Yeah! All that spit loosened up that earwax that you can’t reach,” Uma commented easily, and Evie groaned, wincing at the thought. However, Audrey was much more dramatic and actually gagged at the statement. Uma snorted loudly and held her stomach as she fell back against her seat.

Mal grinned wickedly as Evie suddenly parked the vehicle near a small thicket. Evie turned Charlene off and as soon as she did, she set about wiping her ear with both hands holding the paper towel.

After a few more moments of this, Uma finally decided to get out so she could start setting everything up. So, she opened her door, but she grabbed Audrey first, dragging the pink princess so that she exited the vehicle first.

“Ow, what’d you do that for!” Audrey whined. Uma simply raised an eyebrow and eyed the princess skeptically.

“Didn’t want you going and locking me out again,” Uma acknowledged, and Audrey scoffed.

“You think I was responsible for that?” Audrey questioned innocently as she placed her hands on her hips. At that moment, Jane slid out of the car alongside Audrey.

“I do know you. After going off on three trips with you now, not to mention the time I spend with you girls on a regular basis, I feel like I’m pretty familiar with your petty sense of revenge,” Uma pointed out, and Audrey seethed as Uma started toward the back of Charlene to pull out the massive tent they had gotten. Along with Jane, she followed Uma around the rear of the car.

Mal looked back at them as they started searching for the tent, and she then returned her gaze to Evie who was not wiping quite as fervently now. Mal softly smiled at the bluenette, waiting for her to notice. Evie finally looked in Mal’s direction, and after a moment, Evie finally let go of her slight grudge at Mal for laughing with Uma, allowing a small smile on her face.

“You about through?” Mal asked, and Evie nodded as she stuffed the napkin in her pocket. They both looked at each other for a moment before sharing a smile of determination and exiting the Jeep.

Once they were out, Uma, Audrey, and Jane had migrated to the campsite nearby. Evie and Mal headed over to them, linking arms as they headed over.

“Whatever, but I am not petty!” Audrey cried, the both of the girls obviously in the middle of some argument, and Uma rolled her eyes as she largely ignored the princess in favor of pulling out the parts for the tent. Mal and Evie watched as the pirate found a small booklet in the bag, examining it for a moment before throwing it over her shoulder and almost hitting Audrey with it.

“Hey!” Audrey furrowed her brow as she glared at the pirate. Evie headed over and picked up the booklet, flipping through its pages.

She quickly realized that it was the instructions for putting together the tent, and she stepped forward as she approached Uma with pursed lips. Evie held out the handbook, purposefully bumping it into Uma’s arm in an attempt to get the pirate’s attention. Uma turned to look at the paper in Evie’s hands, and Uma waved her away upon reading the front.

“I don’t need no instructions. I’m perfectly capable of handling this by myself,” Uma dismissed, and Evie eyed her strangely before shaking her head and deciding to simply watch Uma.

Mal then turned to Audrey and Jane.

“Okay, we need to get rocks and some sticks so we can have a fire,” Mal directed, and the two AKs nodded easily as they both started off together in different directions. Mal leaned over to Evie, looking at the girl questioningly.

“You got this?”

“Yeah,” Evie replied in a stage-whisper as she grinned, and Mal offered her a thumbs-up and a playful wink before heading off to help Audrey and Jane.

Evie quietly watched as Uma started trying to stuff two pieces together that definitely weren’t compatible in the least. Evie opened her mouth before thinking better of speaking and closing it carefully. She furrowed her brow as Uma stuffed another part together, successfully making the beginnings of the tent look even more insane.

And as Evie looked at the instructions, Evie finally decided she absolutely had to put in her suggestions.

“Hey, Uma?” Evie piped up, looking between Uma’s handiwork and the instructions.

“Yeah?” Uma replied, not really paying attention to Evie’s words as she stuck her tongue out in concentration.

“According to the instructions, you need to take that bottom one and attach it to that top one,” Evie spoke, and Uma groaned, rolling her eyes as she turned to look at Evie from her knelt position.

“Look, I’m too good for instructions. They cramp my style,” Uma spoke, and Evie sighed slightly, raising an eyebrow as she wordlessly wondered if Uma was going for an abstract sort of style.

“Besides, I’m captain.”

“What am I?”

“You can be first mate or prized barnacle. I’m taking applications now that Harry and Gil turned out to be pansies,” Uma spoke, and Evie could hear the slight laugh in Uma’s voice as she was clearly joking. Evie rolled her eyes, but both of their eyes widened when the tent suddenly fell apart.

There was a moment of silence as Uma sighed deeply in frustration. Evie swallowed before looking down at the manual and returning her gaze to the back of Uma’s head.

“Hey, Uma?”

“Don’t even start.”

Meanwhile, during Evie and Uma’s struggles with the tent, Mal, Audrey, and Jane were searching for good rocks and wood. Jane had wandered off to look for rocks in one direction while Audrey went out a little ways to find wood. Mal had stayed in the area that the three had originally arrived in, and Audrey was just now returning to Mal.

“Any luck?” Mal inquired before gazing up at the princess.

“It’s a forest. So, guess what? I found plenty of sticks,” Audrey proudly proclaimed with a hint of sarcasm, and Mal smirked in response to the princess’s comment.

“Cool,” Mal replied, still on the search for good rocks. Audrey looked around, and as everything quieted, Mal suddenly heard something.

“Hang on a minute. Do you hear that?” Mal questioned, and Audrey paused for a moment to listen. She nodded, and they both headed toward the source of the sound.

Through the bushes, they quickly found a small river. They shared a glance, and Mal smiled as she realized that she had just found a wealth of rocks available for the taking.

“Alright! Well, I guess we’ve found both a good source of water and a good source of rocks,” Mal pointed out with a slight chuckle, and Audrey grinned in response to the faerie.

“Wow. It’s so amazing, isn’t it?” Audrey acknowledged, looking at the expanse of water spread out before them. Mal nodded slowly, trying to push past her initial trepidation around water. After all, she knew how to swim now that Uma had taught her. But it still didn’t mean that she wanted to swim or get around water unless she absolutely had to.

“I guess we should probably tell Jane that we found some rocks,” Mal spoke finally, and Audrey nodded in agreement. After a moment more of observing the river, they then turned to go find Jane.

The both of them soon spotted Jane, and the fairy was looking all around the ground for rocks that could possibly work for the fire pit. As they approached, Jane looked up at the two and she sighed in relief as she realized that Mal had an armful of rocks.

“Oh, thank goodness. I didn’t think I’d ever find any rocks,” Jane told them, and Mal grinned at her as Jane took some of the rocks from Mal to help her out.

The three then headed back over to Uma and Evie.

“Hey, Uma?”

“Would you stop ‘hey, Uma-ing’ me?!” Uma demanded, throwing a hand out in exasperation as she tried to put together the tent.

“Sorry… I was just wondering how you managed to put Part B in Part A. According to the instructions, you’re supposed to put Part B in Part C and Part A in Part D while connecting E to B,” Evie explained, and Uma furrowed her brow, turning around to gaze at the bluenette.

“What?”

“That’s what the instructions say,” Evie defended her words, holding up the instruction manual, and Uma rolled her eyes.

“See, now that’s why I don’t follow instructions. They are too dang confusing,” Uma pointed out, and Evie sighed deeply before catching sight of Mal and allowing a giant smile to overcome her face.

“Hey,” Evie greeted as the three girls threw their sticks and rocks on the ground in the center of the clearing. Uma craned her neck, looking back at the girls as her face melted into a relieved expression.

“Oh, praise all that’s holy. Take her away! She is driving me insane!” Uma complained, and Evie just huffed in response to the pirate’s dramatics.

“So have you put up the tent yet?” Mal asked as she leaned down and started to form a vague shape of a fire pit with the collected rocks.

“I’m making good progress,” Uma replied vaguely as she swiftly pushed some pieces together. Evie sighed before turning to Uma.

“But, Uma, you need to follow the instruct---”

“I told you, I don’t need no instructions! I am the pirate captain!” Uma explained as she crammed several more parts. After a few more moments, Uma finally made a pitiful-looking tent. She then turned to face them all, standing up as she smirked and struck a confident pose.

“What’s my name?!” Uma’s voice rang out proudly.

They all turned their attentions to her and as soon as they did, the tent fell apart on the ground there behind Uma. Uma slowly closed her eyes, biting her bottom lip in barely restrained frustration.

There was a beat of silence before Jane suddenly spoke up in the barest of mumbles to respond to Uma’s prior confident exclamation.

“Shrimpy.”

They all immediately started to laugh.


	4. Thieves in the Night

“Okay, y’all ready to hear it?” Uma questioned, grinning widely as the light of the fire illuminated her teeth.

“No, but you’re not going to stop until we do,” Audrey pointed out with a slight groan, taking a bite out of her sandwich.

It was nightfall. The girls had somehow finally managed to set up the tent thanks to mostly Evie’s directions and Mal’s insistence that Uma follow them closely. Uma had actually managed to put it up mostly like the directions said, but there was one stubborn place that wanted to have a bit of a hole exposing the sky.

Uma and Mal had managed to push forward a few logs so that the girls could sit around the fire, and currently they were gathered around it and each eating their choice in sandwich. Evie was sitting on a log and Mal was sitting there on the ground, Mal’s back pushed between Evie’s legs as she rested an arm on Evie’s thigh comfortably. Audrey and Jane were sitting together on the same log, leaving Uma to sit on the other side of the fire as she readied herself to tell her great story that she had been wanting to recount for so long.

“Alright, then,” Uma spoke, standing up to look at the other four in the group.

“Now let me just say that this was recounted to me from a kid from Auradon Prep when I was taking them on a tour through the museum. He had just come home from a camping trip at this very area, actually,” Uma started, and Audrey rolled her eyes with a huff.

“Of course that’s how it went. It’s not like you’re telling us that it’s real information just to scare us,” Audrey spoke, and Jane shook her head at Audrey, turning her attentions to Uma.

“Audrey, you know these things are always true!” Jane expressed. Evie looked at the two girls skeptically, and ultimately chose to ignore them in favor of listening to Uma’s story. She ran her fingers through Mal’s hair carefully as she took a few bites of her sandwich.

“But the poor boy seemed really shaken up, and I thought I’d tell you guys about it,” Uma pointed out, nodding to the girls. Mal allowed a slight smirk to grace her face, fully confident that Uma was just trying to scare them again.

“So apparently, back in the early nineteen-hundreds, there was a house on this lot that we’re standing on. Which I guess would explain the old logs we found around here in the bushes for us to sit on, doesn’t it, Mal?” Uma pointed out, and they all couldn’t help but glance about at the logs. Mal raised an eyebrow suspiciously, but didn’t say anything as she stuck to her belief that Uma was full of it.

“It really does… These do look like housing logs,” Evie observed and Mal rolled her eyes affectionately at the bluenette, squeezing Evie’s knee carefully from her place on the ground before Evie.

“E, how do you know what housing logs look like?”

“I don’t, but they do have slots in them like Lincoln Logs,” Evie pointed out, and Audrey, Evie, and Jane eyed the logs somewhat fearfully after Evie’s surprisingly astute reflection. Uma just nodded to Evie slowly before continuing in her story.

“And during that time, there was a couple living there.

“They were a really sweet couple---”

“Oh, this could be a happy story!” Jane piped up with a nervous yet hopeful smile, and Uma’s eyes rested on her carefully and silently for a long moment.

“But the man was known for his thunderous temper,” Uma continued, and Jane immediately deflated, curling in on herself a bit.

“Definitely not going to be a happy story,” Jane mumbled underneath her breath.

“One night, the man came home and he heard another man’s voice coming from his and his wife’s room. He immediately knew what was going on,” Uma proclaimed somberly, and Audrey couldn’t help but get into the story a little more, despite the fact that she was mostly sure it was fake. However, the logs around her were sort of unnerving her and taking away some of her resolve surrounding that subject.

“And at that moment, he was taken over by a blinding and enormous rage. And that was when he went out back.

“Now the wife in her infidelity had no idea that ol’ Jim Dear had heard anything, so while she’s blissfully unaware, Jimbo’s out back,” Uma spoke, quietly and eerily, and Evie swallowed a bit, not having a good feeling about this as she finished off her sandwich carefully.

“But she started to catch on when she heard the creaking of the floorboards and the scraping of something going _scratch_ … _scratch_ ,” Uma scraped the soles of her shoes across the ground carefully, emulating the sound. Mal immediately noticed Evie’s hand growing a little tighter against her scalp, and Mal just patted Evie’s leg gently and reassuringly, chomping on the remains of the PB&J she had been enjoying.

“And the oddest thing was… He was whistling a tune all innocent-like,” Uma whistled a bit, and Jane scooted closer to Audrey, “and she immediately knew who he was.

“And it was then that he charged through the door, hacking and whacking, hacking and whacking,” Uma gestured with her hands as if she had a large axe, and Jane grabbed onto Audrey tightly. Evie moved her hand from Mal’s head to her shoulder as she leaned down, holding Mal tightly in her arms as she fretted a bit over the story.

“Authorities never managed to find him after that, but they tore down his house and made it into federal property and later into a national park,” Uma told them carefully.

“But the boy swore up and down that he caught glimpses of him, wandering through these trees, whistling as he went,” Uma recounted, whistling that same little tune from earlier, and Jane’s eyes went hugely wide as the wind rustled the leaves.

“So who knows? We could run into him, too. Let’s just hope we’re not unlucky enough to run into the axing end of him,” Uma finished softly and deliberately.

There was an exceedingly disturbing silence as the wind blew softly around them, and Evie shook a bit as cold chills went down her spine. Mal just let Evie hold onto her, knowing that the bluenette was seeking a bit of comfort in the wake of this horrifying tale.

“Welp, night!” Uma shortly bade everyone goodnight before heading over to the tent, unzipping it, and crawling in. Audrey’s eyes went wide as she watched the pirate enter.

“Umm… I think I’m going to retire,” Audrey spoke aloud, getting up and stepping back toward the tent slowly before making a break for the inside of it. Jane followed her quickly, leaving Mal and Evie sitting outside.

Mal raised her eyebrows as she realized that everyone hearing the story must have been indeed quite shaken by it.

“M?”

“Yeah?”

“Do you think we should be scared?”

“Nah… Not really. Uma’s always been full of it,” Mal expressed as she got to her feet and stood up.

“But how do you explain the Lincoln Logs?” Evie nervously asked, looking up at her best friend from her own current sitting position on the log. Mal just turned back to look at Evie, raising an eyebrow at the girl.

Evie genuinely looked quite concerned and Mal softly smiled at her best friend. Mal then held out her hands to Evie, pulling the taller girl up from her seat. Mal squeezed Evie’s hands a bit.

“I promise, it’ll all be fine,” Mal assured her, and Evie nodded slightly, listening to Mal’s words carefully.

“Now, let’s head to bed,” Mal told her as she turned around, reaching into the nearby cooler holding their food and drinks in it. She pulled out a small can of strawberry cola, cracking it open and quickly guzzling it all down.

“M, are you sure that’s a good idea? We didn’t bring any toothbrushes, and besides, you know what soda does to your stomach,” Evie chastised gently, obviously not scared enough to forego scolding Mal and trying to take care of her. Mal just winked at Evie with a wicked grin and started toward the tent, Evie quickly behind her as the bluenette rolled her eyes.

Mal crawled into the tent, stepping on Uma’s legs as she passed, and Uma grunted.

“Just make yourself right at home, then. No worryin’ about squishing nobody or anything,” Uma commented, and Mal just put a little more pressure on Uma’s legs for good measure before moving over into a sleeping bag opposite of the three lined up against the other side of the tent.

Evie very carefully got into the tent with her, and she slid over nearby Mal where Mal was getting into her sleeping bag. Mal snuggled down into the bag, but she stopped as she felt someone’s gaze upon her. Mal turned to face Evie, and she realized the bluenette was looking at her pitifully and was currently using a bit of puppy-dog eyes. Mal furrowed her brow.

“What?”

“Can I, please?” Evie simply begged, and Mal suddenly realized precisely what Evie was talking about as she looked between the purple-haired girl and the sleeping bag. Mal sighed slightly before smiling and scooting over a bit.

Evie immediately beamed upon the invitation, and she wasted no time in shimmying down into the sleeping bag with Mal. Mal smiled slightly as Evie’s arm immediately draped itself around her, and Evie got comfortable against her.

“Oh, crap, guys, I almost forgot. I need to text Dad,” Mal said, reaching down in the pocket of her sweatpants and withdrawing her phone. Mal lifted her phone slightly as she started to text.

“I wouldn’t even bother. I haven’t managed to find any connection,” Audrey spoke, and Mal pursed her lips slightly as she realized that Audrey was right. Evie glanced over to meet the faerie’s eyes from her position with her chin rested on Mal’s shoulder.

“I guess I’ll try anyway, though. Just in case we find some tomorrow,” Mal told them, and Evie nodded slightly, already growing a bit drowsy as a result of the warmth of Mal against her so closely in the sleeping bag.

After a few moments, Mal finished typing the text, and she moved her phone so that it was resting on the canvas covering of the floor nearby her. Mal closed her eyes, letting out a deep breath as she leaned her head slightly against Evie’s.

“A’ight, night, y’all,” Uma turned over as soon as she realized that Mal was through, and everybody replied to the pirate in some manner or another before snuggling deeper into their sleeping bags and closing their eyes.

All in all, it seemed that it would be a peaceful night, despite Uma’s positively horrifying story.

That is, until something started moving and pilfering outside of the tent.

Evie, as a light sleeper, had naturally heard the noise, and her eyes shot open as she looked about in pure, unadulterated horror. She knew she had heard something, and her thoughts had immediately drifted to Uma’s campfire tale.

However, after a moment, there was no sound, so Evie allowed herself to scoot a bit closer to Mal and close her eyes. She must have simply thought she had heard something. Sometimes dreams got too vivid, and she woke up thinking she was living in it a bit.

Then, a scraping sort of sound on the ground started, and Evie’s eyes shot open in horror as she realized that she hadn’t been mistaken after all. Evie froze firmly next to her best friend, remembering well the scraping sound that Uma had performed on the ground that had well-imitated the sound of an axe being dragged against the dirt.

Evie immediately knew that the killer that Uma had talked about was just outside of their tent.

So, barely moving due to her immense fear that was overtaking her, she poked Mal’s cheek carefully, attempting desperately to get her attention. She didn’t dare whisper, not yet.

Mal shifted slightly, furrowing her brow and grumbling under her breath as she tried to ward Evie’s finger away. Evie suddenly heard a slight thud on the ground and Evie’s eyes widened as she furiously poked at Mal’s face.

After a few moments, Mal’s eyes fluttered open and she looked over at Evie as if the bluenette had lost her mind. She started to open her mouth and say something, but Evie quickly covered it with a hand before leaning near Mal’s ear and whispering with barely any volume.

“Jimbo is outside our tent!” Evie explained in complete fear, and Mal raised an eyebrow at Evie, losing all signs of irritation in favor of tiredness. Mal reached up and started trying to pry Evie’s hand from her mouth. However, Evie clamped it on a bit tighter as she froze, looking in the direction of the sounds that she had heard earlier.

Evie kept her hand firmly over Mal’s mouth as they both listened.

After just a moment, there was a scuffling sound outside, and Mal furrowed her brow as she looked in the direction that Evie kept staring in. Mal slowly sat up, and Evie let her hand fall away from Mal’s mouth in favor of looping her arm in Mal’s fearfully.

Mal’s eyes narrowed, and a soft glow started to light in her eyes as she carefully crawled forward, accidentally walking on Uma in the process.

Uma, being an easy waker if touched, arose immediately, furrowing her brow as she realized it was Mal with Evie shakily following her. Uma was about to speak, but quickly chose not to as she noticed that Mal’s eyes were glowing. Uma swiftly moved so that she was on her hands and knees as she flanked Mal carefully.

Mal reached for the zipper ever so slowly as she listened to the sounds outside. She waited just a moment before suddenly unzipping the tent and barging out, Uma hot on her heels and Evie hesitantly but bravely coming out with her best friend.

Mal was just about to go into dragon mode when she realized that she was currently face-to-face with a group of raccoons. The humans and the animals stared at each other for a moment before suddenly running off, food in their jaws and little hands.

Uma’s eyes widened as she pushed past Mal and looked inside the cooler.

“What the--- those little theives stole our food!” Uma announced, turning to look at Mal with a positively infuriated expression. Mal just gazed back at her somewhat blankly, still coming down from the energy workup that had occurred when she had been aiming to transform.

“Honestly, I’m thankful that it was just raccoons and not Jimbo,” Evie expressed thankfully as she smiled a bit in relief, and Uma shot her a peeved glance.

“Have you lost your mind?! Jimbo’s the least of our problems! We just got all our food stolen right underneath our noses!” Uma cried, and Evie sidled up to Mal.

At that point, Audrey and Jane suddenly peered out of the tent, Audrey looking as if she were barely conscious whereas Jane looked fully alive and awake. Jane had presumably awoken Audrey. After all, Audrey wouldn’t wake up if a parade was marching right beside her.

“What in the frick frack tick tack paddy whack is going on here?” Audrey questioned, barely aware as she slurred her words a bit. Mal snorted at her words, a little dazed but not enough to be unappreciative of Audrey’s uncharacteristic impropriety.

“We’ve been robbed!” Uma exclaimed, looking positively miffed as she paced a bit, looking down at all of the ripped open baggies. Audrey’s eyes opened widely as she looked back in the tent swiftly, searching somewhat frantically for something. Before long, she rematerialized with a relieved expression.

“Oh, phew… They didn’t get my phone,” Audrey breathed out in relief, and Uma scoffed.

“Get your priorities straight! We ain’t got no food!” Uma informed the pink princess, and Audrey suddenly realized the mess around their campsite.

“Oh, gosh, you’re right.”

The five were quiet for a few moments before Audrey sighed slightly.

“I guess we’re going to have to go back and face the facts. We can’t last a single day out here,” Audrey admitted, sighing deeply as she shook her head. Uma’s eyes suddenly hardened as she looked around the moonlit camp.

“No. No, we’re not going back tomorrow. Those little rats invoked my wrath and I ain’t taking this one laying down. We are sticking this out.”

“How’re we going to do that?” Jane questioned uncertainly, and Uma offered Jane a slight smirk. Evie and Mal looked at each other in worry, deeply concerned about Uma’s next statement.

“Well. I reckon we’re just gonna be roughin’ it.”


	5. The Art of Getting Brunch

“Uma, if you think we’re going to stick it out through this, then you are sorely mistaken!” Audrey cried, and Uma simply snorted in reply as she took a swig of a can of soda. The raccoons had fortunately not taken any of the soda cans. It was presumably because the aluminum was not edible.

Ever since the other four had awoken this morning, Audrey had been fussing and ranting and raging about how she could not possibly under any conditions remain at the campsite. Even Jane appeared as if she had her fill of the complaining, despite the fact that she seemed to agree with Audrey’s opinions on the subject of remaining at the campsite.

“Well, then why don’t you call ol’ Alfalfa to come pick you up?” Uma suggested, and she finished off her can with a lick of her lips.

“I have no internet connection, Uma! NONE! And his name’s Alfred!” Audrey cried, correcting Uma about the butler’s name, and the pirate shrugged with a grin as she stood up from her place on a log near the fire pit. Audrey shook her head rapidly as she started to pace.

“We have no food! We have no way to _get_ food! We’re going to starve!” Audrey exclaimed dramatically, and Mal raised an eyebrow at her.

“And more importantly, we have no wifi!” All of the girls just stared at Audrey, unimpressed with her prioritizing. Audrey shrugged a bit, crossing her arms over her chest somewhat defensively as she huffed.

“Food was the dealbreaker, though,” Audrey proclaimed haughtily, and Uma rolled her eyes as she straightened and looked around the campsite.

“Now, princess, the way I look at it is that animals manage to eat out here, so we can, too,” Uma explained, and Audrey just stared at the pirate as if she were completely out of her mind.

“But those are animals! We are people! And some of us are people with very refined palates and sophisticated diets!” Audrey whined, and Evie raised her eyebrows as she looked at Mal from their position sitting on the other side of the fire.

“Talk about a drama queen,” Evie murmured to Mal, and Mal grinned mischievously at her best friend as she nudged the bluenette’s shoulder.

“I don’t think you have any room to talk, Jimbo-spotter,” Mal referenced what had happened just that past night, and Evie looked at Mal affectionately with a tilt of her head.

“But I’m not that bad,” Evie chuckled, and Mal shook her head with a slight shrug.

“Sometimes,” Mal deadpanned, holding back her smile as she messed with Evie.

“Sometimes?!” Evie faked offense as she looked over at her little sister with a playful gaze. Mal just wrapped an arm around Evie affectionately, giving her a quick squeeze of reassurance.

“I love you, though,” Mal assured her lovingly, and Evie beamed as Mal pulled away slightly to keep talking to her.

“Yo, Siamese twins?!” Uma interrupted their talking quickly, and the two looked at Uma, curious as to what she wanted.

“I’m going to go and find us some food. Y’all gonna help?” Uma questioned, and Mal nodded, getting up to accompany Uma. Evie quickly followed, ready to help Mal with anything she needed.

“No, no! Mal, you tell her we’re going home now!” the pink princess demanded, and Mal watched Audrey for a moment before shaking her head regretfully.

“I’m sorry, Audrey, but I told Uma I’d stick with her. Besides, I’m kind of interested about how she’s planning on doing this,” Mal acknowledged, looking over at Uma with a smirk.

“That’s my girl!” Uma grinned widely, high-fiving Mal and clasping her hand with the faerie’s for a moment before allowing her digits to slip from Mal’s own. Uma then settled for watching Audrey with a victorious grin.

Audrey huffed and puffed for a moment before looking to Evie in an act of pure desperation.

“Come on, Evie. Fellow woman of propriety and civilization, back me up here,” Audrey pleaded, and Evie quietly looked between the pink princess and Mal before shaking her head quickly, looping her arm through Mal’s.

“I’m sorry, Audrey, but I have to stick with my best friend. I can’t leave Mal out here by herself.”

“Ugh! You’re such a brown-nosing suck-up!” Audrey insulted in the midst of her pure frustration at the fact that she was getting effectively outvoted by the VKs. Audrey knew that Jane was on her side, and she had really hoped that Evie would join her, despite the fact that she knew that would never happen realistically.

“I prefer to call it loyalty,” Evie expressed, and Mal gazed at Evie lovingly. Evie puffed up a bit before Mal’s approving gaze, looking quite pleased with herself indeed.

“Okay, princess, have you gotten your answer now? Let’s go forage,” Uma proclaimed proudly, heading out and the others starting to follow.

“Oh, wait a minute, girls! I brought some books that might help us!” Evie cried suddenly, interrupting them, and she hurried to her Jeep, withdrawing a few hard-cover books from underneath Mal’s seat. Evie shut the door swiftly and strode back over to them.

Mal stared at her best friend somewhat blankly, shocked that Evie had seriously stored books in the car. Evie stood there before her, just looking at them with that usual sparkle in her eyes.

“So you thought you’d pack a few books for camping, huh?” Mal asked affectionately, knowing Evie’s nigh obsession with being perfectly prepared. Evie wasted no time in nodding.

“Actually, there’s books underneath all of our seats just in case of emergency,” Evie answered with an easy smile, and all of the girls stared at her somewhat strangely.

“So what? Have you just made your car into a portable library or something?” Uma questioned and took a book, raising an eyebrow as she eyed the bluenette.

“I guess you could say that,” Evie shrugged nonchalantly, and they started off down a beaten path leading further into the woods. Uma flipped through the book that she had taken from Evie.

“Hmm… A book of poisonous and safe nuts that naturally grow in the wild,” Uma read aloud to the girls, pursing her lips as she considered the book. Evie opened the other book in her arms that Uma had not confiscated, and Mal leaned her head against Evie’s arm to see what was written in it.

“This is a book of berries that complements the book you have,” Evie pointed out, and Uma nodded slowly.

“Okay…” Uma happened to look to the side and she spotted a bunch of berries on some greenery on a nearby tree.

“Yo, Blue, tell us about this berry,” Uma told Evie, plucking one from the plant as she held it out to the taller girl. Evie examined it carefully before flipping through her book.

Before long, she found an entry for the berry, and she smiled widely as she started to read.

“This is a berry from the _Hedera Helix_ or the common ivy. The _Hedera Helix_ is a plant common to most of Auradon, and it is a species of flowering plant in the family Araliaceae.”

“Okay, so guess what? I really don’t care about the plant,” Uma expressed, and Evie flashed her the barest of glances before continuing.

“It is a climbing plant and its berries are small, greenish-white, and grow in umbrella-shaped clusters,” Evie explained, and Uma rolled her eyes, examining the berry for herself, and coming to the conclusion that it was likely safe, but Evie was taking entirely too long to get to that part.

“Many birds eat these berries and distribute them throughout the forest---”

“Birds eat them? Oh, well, they’re safe,” Uma acknowledged before popping one into her mouth swiftly.

“No, Uma, don’t! It says it’s poison!” Mal screeched, finally reaching the part about the berry’s poisonous qualities or lack thereof. Uma’s eyes widened and she spit the berry on the ground, wrinkling her nose as she spat a considerable amount of saliva onto the ground.

“Ew, man, that was gross! Even I could tell you that was poison! That stuff tasted like poison!” Uma proclaimed, and Audrey was already panicking.

“Uma’s going to die and we’re still going to be stuck out here because we’ll have a tie between people staying out and going back home!” Audrey cried.

“Gee, thanks for worrying about my wellbeing!” Uma sarcastically pointed out. Uma spit again, and Evie held out a hand as she reached another part of the passage on that berry.

“Audrey, don’t worry! It’ll be okay! It says that it’s rare that a person ingests enough of the berry for its poison to take effect because it tastes so bad,” Evie finished, and Uma just looked at Evie as if she had lost her mind as she spit once more.

“Yeah, it was nasty. That’s why I didn’t swallow it,” Uma explained, and Evie sighed in relief. Audrey just shook her head worriedly.

“Look, you guys, Uma’s already almost died and I’m honestly scared to look for anything else to eat. Why don’t we just go home?!” Audrey demanded, and Uma shook her head in dismissal.

“I did not almost die. I am tougher than you think, princess. I’ve eaten half-rotted fish before, and look at me. I’m thriving. A little bit of nasty food helps toughen you up a little bit,” Uma explained to the pink princess, and Audrey wrinkled her nose in pure disgust. However, Uma didn’t focus on this as she furrowed her brow in thought.

“Speaking of fish… I wonder if there’s any water around here that we could try to catch fish from,” Uma spoke her thoughts aloud. Audrey immediately looked at Mal pleadingly, mentally begging the girl to avoid informing Uma of the river that they had found.

“Actually, me and Audrey found a river yesterday evening when we were looking for supplies for our fire pit,” Mal expressed, and Audrey groaned deeply. Uma grinned immediately and looked at Mal happily.

“Awesome. Show me,” Uma spoke, and Mal led the group to the river, Evie still looking through her books and Audrey as well as Jane trailing along in the back of the caravan of girls.

Soon enough, they ended up to the side of the river, and Uma was starting to take off her shoes.

“What are you doing, Uma?” Jane asked tentatively, and Uma just raised an eyebrow as she rolled up her pantlegs to her knees.

“I’m going fishing,” Uma told her simply, and Jane looked at her blankly for a moment.

“How are you going to do that? You don’t have a pole,” Jane pointed out uncertainly, and Uma just chuckled, shaking her head at the shorter girl as she straightened.

“I’m gonna catch them without a pole,” Uma explained, and Jane’s eyes widened in shock. Audrey just rolled her eyes and snorted, and Mal and Evie shared an uncertain glance.

“With your bare hands? Pfft, I’d love to see that. Go for it, Davey Crockett,” Audrey sassed, still giggling at the thought of Uma going out into the water to catch fish without any help.

“It’s Davey Jones to you, land-lover,” Uma replied with a smirk before heading out into the water. Mal shook her head, looking at Evie.

“This is not going to go well,” Mal voiced her opinion on the subject quietly, and Evie nodded slightly in agreement as she flipped through one of the books.

Uma stood out in the middle of the rushing river water and she kneeled down, trying to see if she could spot any fish. To her joy, there were plenty of fish flowing downstream toward her.

“Hey, there’s plenty of fish,” Uma called, and all of the girls nodded. Uma huffed as they made no move to accompany her.

“Y’all comin’ in to help?” Uma questioned, and the girls shook their heads.

“Honestly, we want to see you catch a fish without a net or a pole,” Mal replied to the pirate, and Uma rolled her eyes as she withdrew her large pocketknife from her pants pocket.

“I think y’all are just chicken, but whatever. I’ll show you how it’s done,” Uma announced, bracing her legs in the water firmly.

“Just watch the master,” Uma pronounced before readying herself and centering her gaze on a fish coming her way.

As soon as it grew close enough, Uma dove forward and attempted to stab the fish. She jus narrowly missed it, but she spun quickly, hurrying after it as swiftly as she could with her knife at the ready.

“You’re using a knife?! That’s cheating! You’re supposed to get it without tools!” Audrey cried, and Uma chased the fish.

“I never said without tools! I said without a fishing pole!” Uma replied before diving after the fish.

However, she missed the fish by a mile, and instead crashed into the water face-first. When she reemerged, she quickly realized everyone was laughing at her. Uma narrowed her eyes as she stood back up in the water.

She then turned back around, readying herself to try for another.

“Uma, why don’t you come back? We’ll go looking for some nuts and berries instead,” Evie called, and Uma could hear the laugh in the bluenette’s voice. Uma just shook her eyes, gritting her teeth as she felt a growing determination in her to catch the fish.

Uma soon zeroed in on her next target and she made a mad dive for the creature, her knife at the ready. To her immense satisfaction and everyone else’s pure surprise, Uma made a quick and clean kill out of the fish. She then turned back to the others, raising the dead fish in the air as she waded back to the girls, stepping onto the smooth rocks of the shore.

Audrey immediately stepped back, wrinkling her nose as she stared at the fish. Uma grinned as she jutted out her prize on the end of her knife as she shoved it into Audrey’s face.

“EW!!!” Audrey squealed, jumping away from the pirate’s fish that she had caught.

“So, Jane, is my name still Shrimpy?” Uma questioned, waving the fish over toward the fairy. Jane leaned backward away from Uma, shaking her head swiftly as she covered her nose at the smell of the fish.

“I’ve got to give it to you, Uma. That was awesome,” Mal complimented, nodding to Uma proudly, and Uma allowed herself to smile a bit at the praise as she sat the fish on the ground. Evie nodded to Uma with a slight grin, reinforcing Mal’s words.

“So, any of the rest of you aiming on catching some fish?” Uma questioned, and Mal shook her head as soon as the pirate asked. After all, Mal was still very much afraid of water.

“Oh, come on, you giant pansies. Are you scared of killing fish? It’s the same as fishing with a pole. The knife actually is more painless because it kills them instantly instead of letting them suffocate while you’re eyeing them hanging on the end of the line,” Uma explained, and Mal shook her head slightly.

“I know it’s quick, but that’s not the problem. What I’m thinking is that we’re going to need to collect more than just fish to eat,” Mal explained, and Uma rolled her eyes at the faerie.

“So I’m thinking that you and Jane stay here and help Uma. Me and Evie are going to go and look for some nuts and berries,” Mal informed them, and Jane nodded slightly. However, Audrey did not agree nearly as easily. Her eyes widened as she gazed at the fish lying there on the ground before her.

“Help Uma?! Help her?! How am I supposed to help her?!”

“I’ve got extra knives,” Uma offered, holding out a black knife to the pink princess, and Audrey withdrew immediately.

“Have you lost your mind?!”

“Well, if you’re not going to help her, at least keep an eye on her. You two know how to swim pretty well, so if she were to have an emergency, you two could help her,” Mal explained, taking Evie’s arm gently, and Audrey just groaned.

“Ugh… I can’t believe you two are leaving me with her!”

“Aw, come on, Audy. We get some quality time together, and you’ve got to be a little complainer. Don’t you love me?” Uma questioned, and Mal and Evie shook their heads, heading off into the woods.

“Not enough to turn savage!” Audrey cried, her voice soon drowning out a bit as Evie and Mal headed deeper into the forest.

The two best friends walked along the path, looking along the side of the road and in the bushes as they attempted to find possible food sources. Mal squeezed Evie’s arm affectionately as she pulled away from Evie to examine a berry bush nearby. She picked one from the greenery and brought it over to her sister.

“Here, E. Check this one out,” Mal showed it to the bluenette. Evie eyed it for a moment before flipping through her book. Mal was quiet for a moment, unable to help thinking of Uma and her insane yet amazing antics.

“Can you believe she seriously stabbed a fish with a knife and didn’t kill herself in the process?” Mal asked, and Evie shook her head with a grin.

“No and yes,” Evie replied, and Mal chuckled at Evie, lightly bumping her shoulder into that of the other girl’s.

“Wow, a real old-fashioned enigma, aren’t you?” Mal teased, and Evie just chuckled in reply as she smiled lovingly at Mal.

“I try to keep it interesting,” Evie replied playfully, and Mal just grinned at the taller girl before Evie suddenly paused on a page.

Mal examined the page, scanning it as she looked for whether the berry was poisonous or not. She wasn’t aiming on falling prey to the same thing Uma had.

“Okay… So this looks a lot like the berry you’ve got,” Evie pointed out, and Mal finally spotted that it wasn’t poisonous.

“Oh, M, it’s a blackberry,” Evie pointed out as she placed her finger just beneath the words written on the page.

“Huh, I was thinking that it looked a lot like one,” Mal commented as she popped the berry into her mouth, enjoying its sweet taste. It was definitely a blackberry, and certainly not poison.

“Hey, M?” Evie suddenly spoke, and Mal looked up at Evie, her mouth a bit stained with blackberry juice as she reached up and wiped at it just barely.

“Huh?”

“The blackberries are everywhere,” Evie pointed out, reaching out and placing her hand on Mal’s back. Mal looked around the thicket that they had found themselves in, noticing that they were currently surrounded entirely by blackberry bushes.

Mal and Evie looked at each other and shared a giant grin.

They were about to bring in a ton of food for their group.


	6. Stinging Realizations

“Alright! Mama’s got the goods!” Uma announced as she came back to the campsite, Audrey and Jane close behind her.

At approximately the same time, Evie and Mal came heading down a path with a ton of blackberries resting in pouches they had made by holding their shirts so that they looked like bags over their stomachs. Evie was beaming proudly, and Mal looked pretty pleased with herself.

“You’re not the only one that’s got the goods,” Mal told the pirate with a grin, and Uma just rolled her eyes good-naturedly. Mal stuck her tongue out at Uma playfully, and Uma chuckled under her breath.

“Did you find more berries?” Jane asked excitedly, smiling as she headed over to the two best friends.

“Are they poison, too?” Audrey couldn’t help but distrustfully question. Evie just laughed heartily and shook her head, squeezing Mal’s arm as she held out her pouch of berries so that the Auradon girls could look at them.

“Oh, blackberries! That’s a relief,” Audrey sighed with a smile, and Mal just raised an eyebrow.

“We aren’t aiming on killing you just yet,” Mal told Audrey, making sure she sounded completely serious. Audrey’s eyes went wide, and Mal couldn’t help but snort. Evie shook her head in a mirthful scold, shouldering Mal gently, and Mal just grinned widely back at the taller girl.

“Alright, y’all ready to skin some fish?” Uma announced, and Mal easily nodded.

“Yeah, I’ll help you,” Mal agreed, and Evie furrowed her brow as they dumped the berries into the nearby cooler.

Evie did not want to touch fish at all. It was her firm conviction that fish were smelly and completely unsanitary to put her hands on. Not to mention that they were sort of slimy.

However, at the same time, Evie wanted to show Mal that she could do as well as Uma and be as self-sufficient as the pirate.

“I’ll help, too,” Evie volunteered quickly, and she immediately felt Mal as well as Audrey gaping at her as if she had sprouted two extra heads.

Evie looked over at Mal and smiled nonchalantly. Mal raised an eyebrow at Evie strangely, and Evie just eyed her with that usual expression of love and affection.

After a moment, Mal let it go. But Audrey most certainly hadn’t.

“Evie?! Why are you agreeing to help them?! Jane, you, and I can rebel against them!” Audrey announced, and Evie just eyed Audrey with a somewhat apologetic expression.

“I’m sorry, Auds,” Evie expressed with a bit of resignation before turning to face the rest of them with a large smile.

That smile swiftly faded somewhat as Uma handed her a fish and a large pocketknife. Evie quickly noticed that Mal had one as well, and she soon remembered Uma’s odd obsession with collecting and keeping knives.

“I’m not touching fish!” Audrey stubbornly announced to the group, crossing her arms over her chest. Jane looked at Audrey uncertainly, and obviously decided that she was on Audrey’s side, however outnumbered it currently was.

Uma chuckled before plopping down on a nearby log near the firepit. Evie sat down next to the pirate, and Mal followed along so that she was resting nearby Evie on the opposite side of Uma.

“Well, princess, are you aiming on eating?” Uma questioned with a chuckle, and Audrey’s eyes narrowed in irritation as she looked at the three girls sitting there and starting to attempt to skin the fish. However, when she realized that each one of them had pocketknives and Uma had two more sitting there on the log nearby her, Audrey’s eyes widened in surprise and she appeared somewhat creeped out.

“Why do you have so many?” Audrey inquired worriedly, and Uma looked up at the pink princess blankly, glancing at the weapons around her. After a moment, she raised her eyebrows in recognition.

“Oh, those! Well, never know when you might need them,” Uma explained with a wide grin, and Audrey just gaped at the pirate.

“You have a serious problem. They put people like you on murder shows,” Audrey pointed out, and Uma just scoffed in reply.

“First of all, people on those murder shows are not simply ‘put’ on there,” Uma air-quoted the word with one hand held up. “The people on the murder shows get themselves on there through their own dirty actions.

“Now that leads me to my second point. I’m not one of those people with dirty actions to atone for,” Uma told her shortly as she shaved at the fish scales. As she returned her gaze to her fish, she realized that Evie was doing something insane with her fish. However, the pirate was currently so engaged in her argument with Audrey that she wasn’t focusing too much on Evie.

“Yeah, but the excessive weapons hoarding is a gateway for dirty actions!” Audrey argued, and Uma just groaned as she furrowed her brow, watching Evie from the corner of her eye.

“It is not.”

“It is, too!”

“And I guess that you’re some kind of TV expert, huh?” Uma absently questioned, paying more attention to Evie’s odd movement as she looked over at the bluenette. Unlike Uma and Mal who were actually using the long side of the blade to shave at the fish, Evie was scraping at it with the point of the knife.

“You just don’t know, Uma. I have watched a _lot_ of television,” Audrey emphasized self-assuredly, and Uma rolled her eyes, looking up at Audrey to offer a snide remark as Evie kept on with those painfully incorrect movements.

“For some reason, that doesn’t really surprise me. And what in the actual heck are you doing?” Uma finally demanded as she turned to look at the bluenette sitting on the other side of Mal, and Evie raised her gaze, looking at Uma curiously as she furrowed her brow and tilted her head a bit in that characteristically innocent manner.

“I’m skinning the fish,” Evie explained, and Uma raised an eyebrow as she looked at Evie’s fish. Currently, it had several holes in it from where Evie had been fruitlessly attempting to take its scales off so it would be ready to eat.

“No, you’re poking the fish. Do it right,” Uma told her, taking her knife like it was a wedge and shaving at the fish quickly and skillfully. Evie pursed her lips slightly as she looked at Uma curiously.

“How do you do it?” Evie asked, and Uma furrowed her brow, trying to think of a simple way to describe it.

“Like you’re peeling a potato,” Uma finally settled for that explanation, figuring that it was a pretty universal experience that practically everyone would be able to understand.

Everyone except for Evie, if the lost look on the bluenette’s face was anything to go by. Uma narrowed her eyes and stopped shearing at the fish in favor of gaping at Evie incredulously.

“Don’t tell me you don’t know how to peel a potato.” Evie suddenly looked very guilty and she leaned toward Mal, putting her mouth nearby the purple-haired girl’s ear.

“M, how do you peel a potato?” she whispered, and Uma rolled her eyes in exasperation as she knifed her fish a bit more furiously.

“Skin the fish like you’re shaving your legs,” Mal explained patiently with a fondness she only reserved for the bluenette. Evie’s eyes widened in recognition as she turned the knife so she was holding it properly.

“Oh! Of course! I’ve got it!” Evie cried excitedly, and actually started to peel at the fish in the correct manner. Uma just shook her head slowly, clicking her tongue in disapproval.

“It is genuinely sad the amount of privilege that you had on the Isle while the rest of us were painstakingly enduring a life of servitude.”

“I did have problems,” Evie replied simply, and Uma just scoffed, not noticing how Mal had narrowed her eyes at the pirate.

“With what? Learning makeup tips that your big brain had no problem with anyway?”

“Uma, lay off,” Mal’s voice rose teasingly, but anyone could hear the definite tone of warning in her voice as she regarded Uma. Uma raised an eyebrow at Mal, but didn’t push Evie any further.

“We all have our scars from the Isle,” Mal finished carefully, keeping that same kind tone but at the same time the underlying snarl waiting just beneath the surface.

Uma shrugged, and didn’t say anything else in regard to Evie’s issues with peeling potatoes or skinning fish. Just by Mal’s last statement, she had easily understood just how Evie had suffered on the Isle. Of course, she had already known it, but it wasn’t the first thing that came to mind when she saw the normally so cheerful girl.

Evie looked to Mal gratefully, leaning against Mal a bit as she comfortably sat there with her. Mal simply smiled softly at Evie in return as she skinned the fish in her hands.

Several moments went by, and they had successfully taken care of a few fish. Of course, Mal had to do Evie’s gutting for her because the bluenette was about to puke at the sight of the fish’s innards.

Everything was going well until Audrey tentatively approached the three on the log.

“Girls, I’ve got a problem,” the pink princess spoke, and Uma looked up at her with an eyebrow raise.

“We do, too, and it comes in the form of fish guts,” Uma shortly replied, the barest hints of a smirk upon her face. Audrey rolled her eyes at the pirate and looked to the other two girls.

“I have to pee,” Audrey told them. Evie and Mal shared a glance and an eyebrow raise.

“Why is it that you always end up peeing in the outdoors?” Uma questioned, looking to the princess with the beginnings of a chuckle rising up within her.

It was true. Audrey did have quite the track record with peeing outside. On their big road trip, Audrey had to pee outside of a gas station and during their time at the farm, Audrey had to pee behind a large tree.

“You know, it seems like nature calls you,” Uma quipped, and Audrey just glared at the pirate.

“Actually, come to think of it, I need to go, too,” Jane spoke up, and Audrey looked to Mal and Evie desperately. Uma wiped her hands on her pants with a sigh, and she started to stand up.

“Alrighty, well, I’ll go with you two,” Uma consented, and Audrey held up her hands in a defensive gesture.

“No!” Audrey yelled suddenly, and Uma furrowed her brow, looking at Audrey strangely. Audrey just laughed humorlessly. “That will not be necessary.”

“Why don’t you want me to go with you? You done got me curious now,” Uma told her, shaking her head and clicking her tongue.

“Because last time you went with me to use the bathroom, you ditched me out there,” Audrey proclaimed, and Uma just chuckled under her breath, remembering the instance well.

“And that’s why I vote for Evie to go with me. Come here, Evie,” Audrey beckoned the bluenette, and Evie stood up before heading over to Audrey. Evie truly had no qualms about helping when she was needed, and this fact did not change in light of the somewhat awkward circumstances.

Uma just narrowed her eyes at the princess before turning to Jane with an easygoing smile. Jane quickly looked at Mal, refusing to meet Uma’s gaze.

“Mal, can you come with me?” Uma glared at Jane, her smile dropping swiftly, and Mal just chuckled under her breath, enjoying Uma’s irritation with the situation.

“Alright,” Mal consented, standing up and getting ready to head out with the fairy.

“Seriously, what the heck, y’all? Why does nobody want me to go with them? I wouldn’t let anything happen to anybody,” Uma assured them, and Audrey just rolled her eyes.

“Says the person who left me out in the wilderness at some stranger’s house because she was scared of a donkey,” Audrey told the pirate, and Uma raised an eyebrow as she eyed Audrey somewhat haughtily.

“I was not afraid.”

“Was that when you were screaming, running, or both?” Audrey asked smugly, and Uma pursed her lips.

“I was not screaming. It was a very womanly expression of terror,” Uma explained herself, and Audrey shook her head before turning to the other girls.

“So where’s the toilet paper?” Audrey questioned, directing her inquiry primarily toward Evie. Evie’s eyes widened a little as she considered Audrey’s words.

“Umm… I thought Uma was getting it,” Evie admitted, and Uma gaped at the bluenette.

“No, I wasn’t told to get anything. I thought princess was getting it,” Uma pointed out, gesturing at Audrey, and Audrey suddenly looked quite offended before glancing at Mal.

“I told Mal to get her servants to gather everything we need,” Audrey proclaimed, looking at Mal somewhat accusatorily. Evie looked to Mal sympathetically and understandingly, knowing the girl hadn’t known to get the toilet paper.

“Honestly, I thought Uma was getting it,” Mal raised her hands in a placating gesture, and Uma placed her hands on her hips.

“Why does the blame always come back around to me? I say it’s Jane’s fault,” Uma pointed to the shorter girl, and Jane’s eyes widened as she looked at everyone helplessly. Mal patted Jane on the back gently, reassuring her that no one thought it was really her fault.

“What am I going to do without toilet paper?!” Audrey cried, and Uma smirked, opening her mouth to speak. Audrey quickly headed her off, “Don’t answer that.”

“I was just gonna say you could use a leaf,” Uma chuckled with a much too pleased smile. Audrey scrunched her nose in disgust and turned away from the pirate in favor of grabbing Evie’s arm and practically dragging her along behind her.

“Come on, Evie, we’re going to the bathroom,” Audrey announced, and headed off in the direction of a tree not too far away, releasing the bluenette’s arm on their way there.

Mal just shrugged, squeezing Jane’s shoulder as the two girls headed off in a different direction.

Uma huffed in irritation before sitting down on one of the logs to continue gutting the fish.

Mal and Jane headed over to a tree, and Jane went behind it. Mal stood a foot or two away with her back facing the tree. She looked over at what she could see of Audrey and Evie, and noticed that Evie seemed to be having a hard time getting Audrey to stop fussing over which tree to go behind.

Mal grinned a bit at the sight, shaking her head as she watched Evie try to convince Audrey to simply settle for one.

After a moment, Jane’s voice piped up very hesitantly.

“Mal?”

“Yeah?” Mal kindly replied, and Jane was quiet for just a moment.

“Do you think I should really use a leaf?” Jane finally asked, and Mal winced a bit, not really enjoying conversating with Jane about how she should go about things now that she had no toilet paper available to her.

“It certainly wouldn’t be a bad idea,” Mal told her after a few beats.

“Okay. I guess I’ll get this three-leafed one,” Jane spoke aloud, and Mal just shrugged.

“Pick out whatever you want. There’s a whole forest full,” Mal responded with a small chuckle, and after a few more minutes, Jane came out from behind the tree.

“All good?” Mal asked, and Jane nodded easily. They then headed back over to their camp, Jane walking ahead of the purple-haired girl.

With Evie, things were going better than they were, and Audrey had finally decided to go behind a tree after what seemed like forever. Evie sighed a bit. However, she suddenly realized that there was an odd buzzing sound around her. Evie furrowed her brow and jerked as she realized a bee was suddenly dive-bombing her.

Evie looked up in the tree in the direction of the larger noise and her eyes widened as she realized that just above her was a large hornet’s nest. Evie cleared her throat before speaking, her eyes locked onto the hive.

“Audrey?”

“What, Evie?” Audrey questioned, seeming slightly irritated which was no doubt as a result of the entire lack of toilet paper. Evie swallowed a bit, trying to push herself a bit closer to the tree in an attempt to avoid looking quite so much like a target.

“You might want to hurry a bit. There’s an enormous hive of bees above us,” Evie pointed out.

“What?! Bees?! I’m allergic!” Audrey cried, and Evie furrowed her brow as she realized that the hornets seemed to be calmer when there was a lack of quick movement.

However, before she could voice this observation to Audrey, the pink princess suddenly screeched and started to run out from behind the tree.

Evie’s eyes widened as she realized that a bee was chasing Audrey. The bluenette threw a nervous glance in the direction of the hive before taking off after the princess. Evie honestly wasn’t sure what she was going to do if she caught her, but she supposed she was trying to stay close by because she now knew of Audrey’s allergy.

“Audrey, they seem to be triggered by motion!” Evie cried as she hurried after the princess.

“No kidding!” she screamed in response.

“What are you two doing?!” Uma demanded, and Evie looked off to the side, noticing that the other three girls were standing nearby and staring at the two that were running about.

“No time to explain!” Evie told them before Audrey suddenly yelped. Evie’s eyes widened as she saw Audrey suddenly freeze. Audrey brought her hand around to her behind swiftly, wincing as she stood there.

“It stung me! Evie, it stung me!” Audrey announced, and Evie fumbled in her pockets swiftly.

“Don’t worry, Audrey, I came prepared!” Evie cried, and Audrey’s eyes widened as she spotted the EpiPen in Evie’s grasp. Audrey opened her mouth, about to advise Evie about where to put it, but she suddenly groaned as Evie slammed it into her behind.

Audrey shut her eyes tightly, grunting deeply in pain, and after a moment, Evie withdrew the pen carefully.

Audrey squinted hard, and Evie slowly put the EpiPen in her pocket as she gazed at Audrey worriedly. Audrey finally barely opened her eyes, looking back at Evie with pain.

“That’s not where you put it,” the princess spoke, her voice exceedingly strained as she looked back at the bluenette. Uma couldn’t help but snort as a result of the entire situation, and Evie gaped helplessly at the princess.

“Oh, my gosh! I’m so sorry! Where does it go?!” Evie demanded.

“It’s supposed to go in the leg,” Jane piped up, her eyes wide as she gaped at Audrey and Evie from her position next to Uma and Mal. Evie’s quickly pulled the EpiPen back out and was going to go for Audrey’s leg when the princess suddenly grabbed Evie’s wrist.

“No, no, no! I’ve already got a big enough pain in my rear. I don’t need one in the leg,” Audrey expressed, and Evie pulled the EpiPen away with a guilty smile.

“Must you be this insanely prepared?” Audrey asked the bluenette after several beats passed, and Evie simply shrugged with one of those one-thousand-watt grins, not really knowing what to say to make this entire situation better.

Uma and Mal honestly still weren’t exactly sure what was going on. They just shared a glance, and Uma shook her head.

“It must be a princess thing.”


	7. Rain, Rain, Go Away

“Y’know, I think I really am Davey Jones,” Uma proudly announced to the group as she cooked the fish meat on a stick over the fire.

“You are aware that’s a guy, right?” Audrey questioned, rolling her eyes as she eyed Uma and her fish in disgust from position on the far side of the log that Jane and Evie were sitting on as well. Audrey was relaxing with her knees on the ground, and her elbows resting on the log so that her sore behind was not touching anything. Uma had already given her heck about the entire episode with getting her butt slammed with an Epi-Pen, and Audrey was in a rather unhappy mood as a result of not being able to sit down on her behind and because of Uma’s endless teasing.

“Well, of course. I’m not an idiot, princess. Unlike some of us,” Uma informed the pink princess, Uma’s eyes sparkling as she eyed Audrey. Audrey just huffed in irritation, squinting a bit as the wind blew somewhat harshly against her face.

“This wind is enough to drive someone insane,” Audrey commented, and Uma nodded, looking around as she gazed into the darkness and the wind blew her hair back.

“Y’know, if I didn’t know any better, I’d say that it was gonna rain,” Uma pointed out, and Audrey winced as she tried to keep her hair away from her berries that she had in her hand.

“What are you? The weatherman?”

“No. You are aware that’s a guy, right?” Uma sarcastically commented, echoing Audrey’s question from earlier with that characteristically snarky smirk. Audrey just scrunched her nose and faked a laugh as she glared at Uma.

Evie rolled her eyes affectionately at the both of them, but her eyes were quickly averted by the sight of Jane sitting beside her and scooting her behind surreptitiously on the log. Evie’s eyes widened as she stared at the other girl for a long moment. However, she couldn’t keep letting Jane do that without letting her know that she was being noticed.

“Jane! What are you doing?” Evie whispered harshly, and Jane looked over at the bluenette, her eyes wide as she stared at Evie, freezing in her motions.

Mal raised an eyebrow from her position relaxing on the ground between Evie’s legs as she had the previous night, her elbows propped on Evie’s knees as she comfortably leaned against her best friend. She was sipping upon yet another soda despite Evie’s warnings, and she had just finished munching on some berries.

“Umm… Nothing,” Jane replied. Evie furrowed her brow, knowing that definitely wasn’t true. The look on her face must have communicated this, because Jane looked over in Uma and Audrey’s direction before she scooted nearer to Evie with a somewhat anxious expression.

“Evie, what do you do when you think you’ve gotten into poison ivy?” Jane questioned nervously, and Evie’s eyes widened a bit as she suddenly realized precisely what was wrong with the fairy.

“Well, what did you, umm… Wipe with?’” Evie awkwardly questioned. Mal raised her eyebrows as she shrugged.

“It had three leaves,” Mal commented quietly, and Evie gazed down at her sister in surprise before returning her gaze to Jane.

“Jane! Haven’t you ever heard the saying about ‘Leaves of three, let them be?!’” Evie demanded in nigh horror, and Jane just looked down sheepishly.

“Obviously not,” Mal commented, sipping from the soda despite Evie’s slightly disapproving glance thrown her way.

Evie sighed deeply, looking around as she tried to decipher how she could help the girl. After a moment, she spotted precisely what Jane needed.

“Okay, Jane, in the hypothetical situation that I ever needed to scratch my behind for whatever reason--- which I have never done and would never do--- I would go very slowly and carefully behind that tree over there and… You know… Take care of it,” Evie told her awkwardly, really not wanting to have to explain things fully.

“Oh! So that’s what you were doing earlier!” Mal teased, her eyes sparkling with mirth, and Evie gazed at her in horror.

“Mal! You know I was peeing!” Evie cried, inadvertently drawing Uma and Audrey’s attention to the conversation that was currently occurring.

“Yeah, but your advice to Jane was way too accurate to be just hypothetical,” Mal replied to her with a grin, and Uma furrowed her brow as she looked between Jane, Mal, and Evie.

“ _What_ are you two talking about?” Uma suddenly questioned as she held her fish over the fire. Audrey nodded in agreeance, gazing at the others with only slight interest.

“Oh, Evie’s just telling Jane how to scratch her butt on a tree,” Mal informed Uma easily, and Evie gasped in response to the purple-haired girl. Mal just laughed a bit as she squeezed Evie’s knee lovingly.

Uma squinted a bit at the others, still trying to understand this situation.

“And why is she giving her that kind of info?” Uma asked, and Mal just looked at Jane as she sipped upon her soda, waiting on Jane to explain herself to Uma. Jane sighed deeply, deciding to take a chance instead of trying to lie about it. After all, maybe Uma could help her.

“Well… I may have gotten into poison ivy,” Jane explained slowly, and Audrey immediately seemed to catch on as she looked horrified, glancing down at Jane’s behind. Uma watched Audrey’s reaction carefully before suddenly seeming to realize precisely what was going on.

After a moment of blankly staring at Jane, the pirate couldn’t help but chuckle, and she shook her head as she tried to control herself at least a little.

“Oh, man… That’s bad, Jane.”

“I know…”

“But don’t worry. Maybe we can look in Evie’s book, and find some kind of poultice that can be made. I’d be glad to chew something up for you,” Uma told her with a perfectly straight face before bursting into boisterous laughter. Audrey just glared at the pirate in disgust and Jane sank down a bit in mortification. Mal just looked between Uma and Jane, trying not to laugh but failing miserably, and Evie gently placed a hand on Jane’s shoulder in an attempt to make her feel a bit better.

“Alright, Uma, let Jane be,” Mal finally defended the fairy, and Jane looked to her gratefully.

“I’m serious, though! She’s gonna need something to fix up that rash on her butt,” Uma replied defensively as she checked her fish, realizing it was done. Uma opened her mouth, getting ready to take a bite of the fish just as she started to hear the rumblings of thunder and the beginnings of wet drops hitting her shirt.

The girls looked around in surprise, but Uma’s expression was one of expectance.

“Oh, well. Figures,” Uma pointed out as she bit into the meat. However, as soon as she did this, it started to pour down rain much harder. Audrey squealed, and Mal got up, grabbing Evie’s hand as they started for the tent.

“Uma! Shut the cooler!” Mal called from inside the tent as she held the door open for Audrey and Jane to get in along with Mal and Evie. Uma wasted no time in darting for the cooler as she slammed it closed. Uma then dove for the tent, landing on top of Audrey inside as Mal zipped it up swiftly behind her.

“Ugh! Get off of me, Uma!” Audrey cried, raising her voice a bit to be heard over the rain. Uma groaned, rolling off of the pink princess, and she laid there on her back for a moment.

Mal and Evie shared a glance, and Evie squeezed Mal’s hand a bit with a smile.

Audrey winced as she rested on her side, trying to keep pressure off of her bee sting.

“Why is it raining?!” Audrey cried, and Uma snorted in response, looking over at the princess with a raise of her eyebrow.

“The clouds had all the water they could hold. I’m sure Evie’s got a more scientific explanation,” Uma gestured to the bluenette, and Evie started to respond, but Audrey interrupted them.

“No, not like that! I mean it wasn’t supposed to rain! Evie was supposed to check!” Audrey announced and everyone looked to Evie. Evie raised her free hand in defense, her other entwined with Mal’s, and she gazed at them all worriedly.

“I did check! It said it wasn’t going to rain!” Evie told them, and Audrey narrowed her eyes at Evie.

“What news station did you check?!”

“Auraweather!” Evie replied, and Audrey groaned deeply as she facepalmed.

“Evie, where are we right now?”

“Auroria?” Evie answered uncertainly, not sure where this conversation was going. Audrey nodded, staring at the other girl. Mal glanced at Uma, and Uma had a slightly bemused expression on her face as she took in the two princesses’ conversation.

“And where do you think Auraweather covers?”

“Umm… Auradon?”

“Auradon City,” Audrey corrected in irritation, and Evie suddenly realized her mistake as she grinned guiltily.

“Oh…”

Audrey groaned in irritation.

“Oh, come on, princess, it ain’t that bad. It’s not like our tent’s leaking,” Uma pointed out in that calm, dismissive manner that she usually used to naysay Audrey’s oftentimes dramatic concerns.

“Umm… Guys? The tent’s leaking,” Jane told them all, pointing to the top of the tent where water was just now starting to pour in. Audrey just looked at Uma with an expression that was something between smugness and aggravation. Uma didn’t utter a word, begrudgingly noting that Audrey had won this battle.

However, after just a moment, it occurred to her precisely how she could get back into the battle and maybe win.

“Well, at least it’s not leaking in more than one spot,” Uma announced, and she flinched as she realized that there was water falling in on her face.

“Guys? There’s water leaking in more than one---”

“Don’t even say it, Jane,” Uma stopped the girl before she could finish her statement, irritated at the fact that Audrey really had had the last laugh.

“Well, maybe if you quit saying stuff like that, Uma, we might not keep getting jinxed!” Mal pointed out, and Uma narrowed her eyes. Before she could begin to reply to Mal, Audrey suddenly yelped as she realized that the water was starting to come in and fall on her head.

“AAH!!! My hair!!!! The water’s going to mess it up!” Audrey screeched, and Uma rolled her eyes.

“Well, just move out of the stream, princess,” Uma effortlessly told the princess.

“What about when the water fills up the bottom of the tent, huh, Uma?! Can’t just move out of the stream then!” Audrey proclaimed, gesticulating wildly at the leaky spots. Uma just groaned, not really knowing how to respond to the princess, but deciding ultimately to ignore her.

Audrey sat there for a minute, putting more weight on one side of her behind than the other in order to avoid aggravating the bee sting, and she leaned away from the stream of water. After a moment, she huffed in irritation and stuffed her phone in her pocket before approaching the tent exit.

“I’m going to Evie’s car!” Audrey announced, and Jane from her place not too far from Uma where she was fidgeting about uncomfortably quickly agreed with the princess.

“Me, too!” Jane concurred, crawling forward to join Audrey as the raining picked up and the leaking significantly increased.

“Y’all are a couple of chickens! Me and Mal will stick it out! We’re big, tough girls! Right, Mal?” Uma looked to the faerie confidently, and Mal shrugged simply in response, looking about the tent somewhat worriedly.

“Fine! You guys get wet out here! We’re staying dry!” Audrey proclaimed, getting ready to get out of the tent.

“How’s that going to work when you’re running out into the rain?” Uma asked, and Mal couldn’t help but agree with the pirate. She did have a good point about all of this.

“Because we’re going to be driest in the end!” Audrey retorted before opening the tent exit and darting out. Jane offered them all a somewhat regretful glance, and ran out after the pink princess. Uma darted for the zipper and closed the entrance so that the rain wouldn’t come in the tent even more.

“Alright. They made their choice, but we’re not wimps! Let’s show them that we’re survivors!” Uma proclaimed, and Mal shared a glance at Evie, and the bluenette looked at her nervously.

Uma pulled her sleeping bag out of the way of the streams of water, and the two best friends followed along with their own bags. Uma then laid down on her sleeping bag. Mal gazed at Evie resignedly and laid down on her own sleeping bag as well.

“We can last through this,” Uma announced, and Evie just scooted close to Mal, snuggling into her side despite the cold and wet surrounding them.

Soon enough, it happened that the tent was getting more leaks and there was significantly more water covering the bottom of the tent.

“Um… M?” Evie finally questioned, and Mal turned to face her sister.

“Do you by any chance feel like maybe going to the car with Audrey and Jane?” Evie questioned, and Mal sighed, looking to Uma.

“E, if you’re cold, go on to the car, okay? Uma’s trying to prove a point, and wants me to help her,” Mal explained carefully before looking at Evie affectionately. Evie sighed slightly.

She didn’t want to leave Mal out here with Uma because that would make Evie look like she couldn’t handle things as well as Uma, and she wanted to be at least perfectly equal with Uma in Mal’s eyes. Besides, she didn’t want to give Uma an additional opportunity to try to take her best friend.

So Evie’s eyes hardened and she forced one of those bedazzling smiles.

“Well, if you two are staying out here, then I’m staying, too,” Evie assured Mal, that undying loyalty shining through with just a hint of jealousy as well.

Mal eyed her strangely for a long moment, but eventually just sighed and allowed her sister to have her way with things and stay with her.

As time dragged on, water began to fill up the bottom of the tent little by little until there was water covering the entire bottom. Evie was now shivering terribly, and Uma was just laying there stubbornly. Mal called a bit of her dragon blood to her as her eyes glowed softly, trying to heat both herself and Evie in the process.

However, despite this warmth Mal was offering, Evie was still trembling, and it drove Mal insane to know that Evie was cold. Also, it was quite irritating to be laying in wetness that was penetrating her sleeping bag.

So she decided that there was no sense in prolonging this torture unnecessarily.

“Alright, Uma, let’s go to the car,” Mal commanded as she sat up, and Evie accompanied her quickly, curling into Mal’s side carefully. Mal put an arm around the bluenette lovingly.

“What?! No way!” Uma immediately protested, looking at the other two girls.

“Yes way. Evie’s cold, and I’m getting tired of lying in a damp sleeping bag,” Mal informed the pirate firmly. “Besides, it really doesn’t matter what Audrey thinks. You lasted longer than her, so you technically won.”

Uma was quiet for a long moment, contemplating Mal’s statement, before finally groaning in exasperation and gathering her things.

“Alright, let’s go,” Uma consented, and Mal squeezed Evie’s arm, cuing her to come with her. Uma opened the tent door exit carefully and darted out with Evie and Mal quickly on her trail. Mal stopped for only a moment to shut it behind them.

Uma rushed for her side of the car, yanking the door open and hopping in as quickly as she could. Evie and Mal each entered different sides of the front of the vehicle, and they shut the doors behind them swiftly.

“Gosh, I thought you guys were never going to get in the car,” Audrey suddenly spoke with an odd amount of care in her voice, and the three jumped a bit as they turned to look at her. Jane was asleep against the window and Audrey was the only one of the two that was awake.

Uma stared at the princess for a long moment before suddenly grinning slyly.

“Aww, was pwincess wowwied about wittle ol’ me?” Uma questioned in baby talk, and Audrey huffed in irritation before shaking her head emphatically.

“Ugh. No! Obviously, I was just staying awake so I could rub it in your face that you’re a chicken,” Audrey informed the pirate, and Mal and Evie shared a knowing glance. As much as Audrey liked to pretend that she didn’t care about Uma, Uma really did mean a lot to the pink princess.

“Ah, that’s rich coming from the girl who tucked tail and ran to the car as soon as the going got tough,” Uma pointed out with a smirk, reclining in the seat as she sprawled out and folded her arms behind her head.

“You know, you are impossible,” Audrey grumpily told the pirate. Uma just smiled winningly as she looked over at the princess. Audrey didn’t look at her, and Uma nudged the princess with her foot fondly. Audrey finally met her eyes and they stared at each other for a long time before Audrey just huffed in exasperated fondness.

The two best friends in the front shared a smile in response to the rare sweetness between the two girls in the back. They sighed and both attempted to get comfortable in their respective seats. Mal reached over for Evie’s hand, and the bluenette wasted no time in lacing her fingers with Mal’s.

And everything was peaceful for now.


	8. Stinky Surprises

Evie opened her eyes slowly, her eyelids fluttering as she awakened. The first thing that she noticed was that the sun was shining absurdly brightly and that it had quite obviously stopped raining. Evie closed her eyes tightly before reopening them just a bit to adjust to the bright world around her.

The second thing that she noticed was that Mal’s hand was still entwined with her own, and she smiled slightly as she looked in Mal’s direction blearily.

But the third thing that she noticed was the real shocker.

There outside of her windshield was an enormous black bear snuffling about her Jeep. Evie’s eyes went wide, and she was immediately completely awake as she jerked, her grip on Mal’s hand tightening ridiculously as she gaped at the sight before her.

Evie’s mouth moved for a moment, no sound coming out as she worked Mal’s hand around in her own. Mal stirred a bit, and Evie suddenly jumped to action, reaching over and shaking her best friend awake.

“Mal! Wake up! Wake up!!!” Evie cried, glancing between Mal and the bear anxiously, and Mal woke up, trying to ward away her sister’s hand as she squinted.

“What is it, Evie?” Mal demanded with her voice rough with sleep, barely awake and in no mood to be awoken in the first place. Evie took Mal’s chin in her hand and turned it toward the bear in front of the car. Mal stared for a few beats, but suddenly the situation seemed to dawn upon her, and she looked much more awake as she jerked backward at the sight of the creature.

“Mal, there’s a bear!” Evie whisper-yelled, and Mal spared Evie a small glance.

“Yeah, no kidding!” Mal replied in Evie’s same tone as she reached back and slapped Uma’s knee.

Uma jerked awake, and accidentally jabbed Audrey’s cheek with her shoulder. Audrey raised her head quickly from where it had been resting on Uma’s shoulder and she rubbed at her cheek painfully, furrowing her brow and eyeing the pirate in irritation.

“What are you doing?!”

“Nothing! You slapped me!” Uma accused, and Audrey recoiled in offense, about to defend herself with that adamance at which she was so talented, but Mal interrupted them, slapping Uma on the knee again as she tried to get the captain’s attention.

“Hey, wait, it was you that slapped me!” Uma realized, pointing at the faerie as she glared. Mal rolled her eyes, looking back at the bear.

“Look, kids, we’ve got bigger problems than whether or not you’re getting slapped!” Mal informed her gesturing at the enormous creature outside of the vehicle. Uma furrowed her brow and looked out the windshield along with Audrey. As soon as she saw the bear, she jumped backward and jabbed Audrey in the gut.

“Ouch! Would you stop abusing me?!” Audrey cried, holding her stomach as she glared at the pirate in irritation and not even having a chance to truly react to the bear.

“Hot dang, that’s a bear!” Uma cried as she grabbed Audrey’ arm impulsively. Jane had somehow or another managed to wake up in the midst of all of this noise, she was practically frozen in terror upon realizing that there was a giant creature outside of their vehicle.

“What are we doing, y’all?” Uma questioned, looking at Mal with a slight question in her eyes. Mal just sucked in a breath and shook her head, watching as the creature stood up on its hind legs to survey the area.

“Well, I don’t think it can get to us from outside. Maybe. Hopefully,” Mal spoke, and the other four girls were all listening to her words carefully as they allowed themselves to loosen just a bit upon the understanding that the bear would perhaps not successfully have the ability to hurt them.

However, they all nearly screamed as the bear placed his front paws on the front of Evie’s Jeep. Uma and Audrey clung on tightly to one another and Jane grabbed onto Audrey as well, clinging onto her back firmly in a manner not dissimilar to a koala. Mal squeezed Evie’s hand tightly, but before she could enjoy this comfort for very long, Evie pulled her hand away from Mal’s.

Mal gazed at Evie and realized that there was a blaze in the bluenette’s eyes. Mal immediately knew what Evie’s problem was.

“That thing’s on Charlene, Mal! It’ll scratch her up! And nothing messes Charlene up!” Evie announced, and Mal shook her head swiftly, already trying to dissuade Evie of what she felt Evie was about to do.

“I know, Evie, I know, but you need to leave it be. We don’t need to make it mad,” Mal informed her, and Evie shook her head as she glared at the creature that was starting to try to climb on top of her car.

“Nothing messes up Charlene and gets away with it!” Evie pronounced, yanking the car door open and hopping out of the vehicle.

“EVIE, NO!!!” Mal screamed before hopping out of the car after Evie, the dragon already making itself known as her eyes started to glow a vibrant hue of neon green. She couldn’t let Evie get hurt. She didn’t know what she’d do if something happened to Evie.

But before she could do anything, she realized that Evie was screaming at the bear.

“Get off my car, you big brute!!! Go on!!! SHOO!!!” Evie cried, and the black bear gaped at her, almost as if it were lost.

“Get out of here, Winnie the Pooh! My car is not your honey pot! Off, off!” Evie screeched, and the creature scrambled off of the vehicle, starting to run away as her voice rang out loudly.

“That’s it! Scat!” Evie yelled loudly and it disappeared into the bushes, its loud footsteps pounding away as it made its escape. Evie then breathed out in satisfaction before turning to her vehicle, happily noting that no damages had been done. She then looked to Mal proudly, a large smile on her face as she watched her best friend’s shocked face.

Mal just stared at Evie as Audrey, Uma, and Jane all got out of the vehicle carefully, watching for the bear almost as if they were afraid that he would soon return. After a moment, Mal’s face lit up in a grin and she laughed a bit as she gave Evie a onceover.

“Wow! Remind me not to ever mess with your car!” Mal pointed out, and Evie just laughed heartily in response to the faerie.

“That was amazing, Evie!” Mal praised after a moment of just staring at the bushes where the bear had disappeared. Evie puffed up visibly with the praise and she smiled widely in the midst of her pleased emotions.

“Good job, Evie! I’ve never seen anything so brave!” Jane smiled admiringly as she gazed at Evie.

“Yeah, Evie, that was incredible!” Audrey finally complimented after overcoming her shock at the entire situation, and Evie just grinned, showcasing that bright and shining row of pearly whites as she headed over to Mal and offered a side-hug.

“Well, I could’ve done it, too,” Uma suddenly piped up indignantly, not liking the fact that Evie had actually managed to best the pirate at something. Uma was supposed to be the tough one in Mal’s eyes, but now Evie had managed to do better than her.

“But you didn’t,” Audrey retorted with an eyebrow raise.

“I wanted Evie to have her moment,” Uma replied to the pink princess effortlessly, the excuse coming to her tongue as naturally as breathing as she waved away Audrey’s comment.

“Uh-huh, and I’m guessing that you were just hanging onto me for dear life as an added bonus to make Evie look braver?” Audrey questioned sarcastically, and Uma rolled her eyes as she scanned her brain for a good response.

“No. I was holding onto you so you wouldn’t be scared,” Uma pointed out, and Audrey just scoffed in reply before a smirk came onto her face for a split second, and she quickly masked it with a gasp.

“Oh, my gosh, Uma, it’s back!” Audrey screeched as she pointed in a direction, and Uma jumped backwards a bit, but quickly sobered as Audrey cracked up laughing. Uma glared at the princess in irritation and groaned.

“Funny. Real fartin’ funny,” Uma grumbled, and Audrey just laughed as she looked at Uma, shaking her head.

“C’mon, girls, let’s go check out our campsite,” Mal called and with Evie’s arm around her waist, led the way to their tent.

As soon as they arrived at it, they gaped at the mess that had been strewed about the entire area. There were fish remains everywhere the eye could see and the berries were completely gone outside of a few stains here and there on the ground where the berry juice had been strewed about.

“Well, I don’t think ol’ Winnie the Pooh was thinking that your _car_ was the honey pot,” Uma acknowledged as she gazed at the monumental damage everywhere. Evie shook herself from her amazed staring in favor of turning to Uma.

“Now you see what he could’ve done to my Jeep. I’m just thankful it was our cooler and not Charlene,” Evie pointed out, and Uma gaped at the bluenette.

“Are you crazy?! Now we gotta go get food again!” Uma exclaimed, and Evie looked down somewhat sheepishly. Mal sighed, and she took Evie’s arm in her hand as she started in the direction of where the two had found the blackberries the previous day.

“C’mon, guys, let’s go get some berries,” Mal instructed, and Audrey and Jane followed along behind her and Evie. Uma stood behind them, staring at the four.

“What about more fish?” Uma questioned, not really excited about the idea of just eating berries.

“You can catch more fish later. Berries are faster, and don’t require as much work just to get ready to eat them,” Mal replied simply, and Uma groaned before catching up so that she was walking alongside Audrey.

“Oh, come on! I want some meat, y’all! I ain’t no vegetarian!” Uma protested, and Mal almost chuckled at the emphasis in the pirate’s voice.

“Apparently,” Audrey quipped, and Uma simply chose to ignore her.

Soon enough, the five were at the berry patch, and they all started to pick at various parts of the bushes around them, watching out for the thorns growing all around the blackberries.

All was silent. In fact, several minutes of picking had passed by when the next noise suddenly sounded off.

“Hey, look, what’s that?” Evie questioned, interrupting the quiet, and Audrey turned to look at the bluenette to see what she was talking about. As soon as her eyes rested upon the object of Evie’s attentions, Audrey almost screamed. It was a small black, fluffball that had a white stripe running up its back. Audrey moved in reverse, stumbling backward hard into Uma. Uma spun around to look at the panicked princess.

“What is your problem?!” Uma demanded, and Audrey shook her head swiftly, attempting desperately to get on the other side of Uma.

“It’s a skunk!”

“Aw, I ain’t falling for that kind of trick agai---” Uma froze mid-sentence and she stared at the creature there on the ground. Uma stepped backward quickly and very unfortunately tripped backward over Audrey.

And she fell over into the blackberry bush full of thorns.

“OW!!!” Uma yelped painedly from her position in the bushes, and Mal as well as Jane started to back away, trying to escape the skunk.

“Evie, get over here, it’ll spray you,” Mal commanded, trying to get her best friend to join her. Instead, Evie just shook her head at the faerie disapprovingly before turning back to the little creature.

“Oh, come on, you guys, it’s just a baby skunk,” Evie told them before smiling adoringly at the baby animal.

“It’s raising its tail up!” Audrey announced in panic, and Mal stepped back, reaching out an arm to Uma as she worked to help her up very slowly and carefully. Uma locked her arm with Mal’s and Mal pulled firmly.

“Oh, you’re just a baby! Look at you! You’re just so cute!” Evie cooed and it looked at her, its small tail raised in warning, and she couldn’t help but giggle at it. Evie then turned back to the others, a no-nonsense expression on her face as she gazed at the rest of them. “You know, some people have skunks for pets.”

Mal and Uma just shared a glance as the pirate was pulled to her feet, blood droplets starting to form around the places where the thorns had stabbed into her arms and palms.

“Oh, I could just adopt you! You cutie! You look just like a kitten!” Evie doted upon the little skunk, smiling widely as she looked down at the baby. Uma rolled her eyes at the bluenette and stepped back with Audrey hiding right behind the pirate.

“Yeah, right, that thing ain’t no kitten, it’s a dang polecat!” Uma commented, carefully and painfully picking thorns from her arms.

“It’s just a baby, and babies don’t spray anybody, do they, cutie? Do they?” Evie playfully questioned as she looked at the skunk.

However, suddenly out of the bushes emerged a much larger skunk with its tail raised up as well. Evie’s eyes went ridiculously large and she stared at the both of them.

“Ooh… You’re not a baby skunk. You’re a big… _Big_ … _Mommy_ skunk,” Evie pointed out, and it approached closer, its tail held high, and Evie started to move backward.

“Now, now…. Let’s be reasonable. Nice skunky, don’t do anything crazy now!” Evie told it, and it jerked toward her. In the midst of her fear that it would do something, she raised her hands up swiftly in an attempt to block any spray.

However, at her sudden movement, it freaked out, and let loose with the worst stink that could possibly be emitted from one creature.

Evie squinted, all of the breath coming out of her with the pure vileness of the stench and lowered her hands a bit in the midst of her disgust. As soon as she did that, the baby skunk sprayed her as well, and she scrunched her face up in disgust as she coughed hard, gagging.

The skunks then hurried off into the bushes, leaving a very traumatized Evie in their wake.

Evie was quiet for a long moment, spitting and coughing and spluttering as she attempted to get the stench out of her mouth, nose, and eyes, but soon she realized that she was not going to be successful in that endeavor.

“M!!! IT SPRAYED ME!!!” Evie cried as she stood up and started to approach Mal and the other girls, her entire person reeking of skunk musk.

Everyone except Jane immediately recoiled, holding their noses and looking at Evie in either horror--- which was undoubtedly Audrey and Uma--- or sympathy--- which was mostly Mal but definitely with a mix of horror. For Jane’s part, she sniffed a bit, and actually didn’t seem to be completely repulsed by the odor.

“It’s burning my eyes!!! Mal, fix it!!!” Evie wailed, hurrying toward her best friend, and Mal jumped backward, trying to avoid the bluenette.

“Aww, heck, that stinks!” Mal cried, covering her nose with her shirt and squinting as she looked at Evie.

“I don’t know, guys, I don’t think it’s so bad. It’s weird, but it kind of smells good,” Jane pointed out, and tilted her head a bit, and the other three gaped at Jane as if she had lost her mind.

“Hello?! Are the fumes getting to your brain and frying it?! That is horrible!” Audrey screeched, and Uma as well as Mal nodded in agreement. Jane just shrugged and didn’t seem bothered at all by Evie’s new perfume, and the other girls just shuddered.

“Well, at least one of us ain’t dying,” Uma pointed out, and Evie started stepping closer to Mal.

Mal stepped back swiftly, evading Evie’s form that continuously tried to get closer.

“M, please!”

“Evie, I love you, but I love you even better when you’re over there. Social distancing, Genevieve, social distancing,” Mal told her, holding out an arm as she tried to keep the other girl from getting too close to her. Evie just poked her lip out pitifully and Uma shook her head.

“Phew! Why don’t y’all go right around there to the river, and she can like try to wash that junk off?!” Uma suggested, and Evie nodded emphatically, starting for Mal in an attempt to take her hand, and Mal jumped out of Evie’s reach.

“Okay, let’s go together, Evie, but at a safe distance,” Mal informed her carefully, and Evie sadly followed Mal toward the river.

After they had been gone for just a moment, Uma shook her head as she looked to Audrey with only a hint of a grin.

“Alright. So, which one of y’all’s pulling these blackberry thorns outta my butt?”


	9. Thiever Beaver

“Alright, E, you go ahead and get in there, and I’m going to go back and help Uma, Audrey, and Jane pick berries,” Mal told Evie as they got to the river. Evie’s eyes went wide as she looked at her best friend.

“What?! No, you can’t leave me! You’ve got to stay!” Evie demanded somewhat worriedly.

“Why? You’ll be fine,” Mal assured her, furrowing her brow and covering her nose again as a whiff of Evie’s rather pungent smell wafted to her nose.

“No, no, no, no, no!!! You can’t leave me here!”

“Why not? What’s the problem with it?” Mal asked, and Evie just shook her head, stepping closer to her best friend, and Mal pinched her shirt a bit tighter over her nose.

“Well, what if it’s like when we went to the country, and there’s like… boys around to see me nearly naked?!” Evie questioned in a whisper-yell, and Mal couldn’t help but laugh at the look on Evie’s face.

“E, I don’t think there’s any boys lurking around. I’ve got to go help the others collect food, okay?” Mal informed her with a shake of her head, and she turned to head toward the rest of the group. Evie hurried forward and grabbed Mal’s arm in her hand, and Mal nearly jumped out of her skin in an attempt to wrench her hand from Evie’s grip.

Mal looked down at her arm in disgust, and Evie just gazed at her apologetically.

“I’m sorry! But please don’t leave me!” Evie cried pathetically, and Mal sighed deeply, closing her eyes. She then reopened them to look in Evie’s. Evie was gazing at her with those accursed puppy dog eyes for which she was so infamous, and Mal groaned.

“Fine. I’ll stay,” Mal assured her, and Evie immediately brightened.

“Thank you, M!” Evie joyfully expressed, moving forward quickly as if she might embrace the other girl, and Mal stepped back swiftly, putting her arms out in an attempt to stop Evie from getting too close. Evie paused and smiled somewhat guiltily.

“Oh! Sorry,” Evie chuckled slightly, and Mal nodded, easily forgiving her.

“You know, you’re lucky I’m a sucker for the puppy-dog eyes,” Mal told her somewhat begrudgingly, but there was a lightness in her expression that gave away her harmless intentions, and Evie just grinned winningly.

“That’s why I use them!” Evie replied joyfully, and Mal gasped in mock offense and shock.

“You scandalous con-woman,” Mal pronounced somewhat haughtily, and Evie chuckled in response.

Evie then stepped forward, shrugging out of her shirt, leaving her in her bra and pants. Mal simply looked at the river nearby as she stepped back a bit, leaning against a tree.

Evie’s nakedness was nothing new to her, after all, but she wasn’t going to sit there and watch her get undressed. That would be a little weird.

Evie then slipped out of her pants and headed out to the water, stepping in just barely. Mal shifted her gaze to look at Evie, and almost laughed at the sight before her. Evie was out in her underpants and her bra, getting into a river and shivering and shaking the entire time. It was an exceedingly ridiculous sight, and she couldn’t help but find it quite humorous.

“Whoo!!! This is cold water, M! Like really cold water!” Evie called, and Mal allowed her laugh to ring out in response to the other girl. Evie swung her head back to look at Mal with a playfully scolding expression, but ultimately, the slight smile on her face gave away her lack of negative sentiment.

“Have fun in your luxury bath!” Mal called, waving from her spot leaned against the tree, and Evie just rolled her eyes as she stepped further into the water and waded out to the middle. The water only ever reached about her mid-thigh, but it was just enough to make it a little difficult to walk through.

Once she was far enough out, she started taking handfuls of water and rubbing them on her arms and face in an attempt to wash. Mal just sighed, not really knowing if it would work, but hoping that this method would decrease a lot of the smell.

“You might get further if you go down beneath the surface, E,” Mal called, and Evie twisted around to look at Mal as if she had lost her mind.

“M, you may have effectively learned how to swim when us five girls went to the Enchanted Lake, but I did not,” Evie explained loudly to be heard over the river as she splashed some water up onto her.

“Yeah, and look at us. I’m the one that’s afraid to get in and you’re the one that’s charging in headfirst. Something seem a little off about that?” Mal questioned, her eyes sparkling as she bantered with her best friend, and Mal caught sight of the giant grin on Evie’s face as she listened to Mal’s assessment of things.

Mal just smirked in satisfaction as she gazed across the water. There were several long moments of silence as Evie scrubbed furiously at her arms and face and chest where her shirt had exposed skin.

However, before Mal could do much more work in her Evie-dubbed position as lookout, she heard a loud noise at the campsite. She furrowed her brow and spun around toward the source of the sound.

Before she knew it, Uma, Audrey, and Jane were running across the path that headed up to the campsite.

“C’mon, y’all, I’ll bet it was a raccoon! Let’s catch it in the act of trying to steal!” Uma excitedly announced, leading the pack of girls.

“Wait for me, guys!” Jane called, hurrying just behind Audrey.

“Uma, what if it’s a bear?!” Audrey cried, looking at Mal helplessly as she hurried by in a silent plea for the faerie to help them. Mal just rolled her eyes, deciding that it would be best if she went to make sure that the three girls weren’t about to be devoured by a bear, and she ran after them.

Meanwhile, with Evie, she had ultimately decided that she wasn’t going to rid herself of this smell so quickly, and she sighed deeply in resignation. She then turned to face where Mal had been standing so she could announce this revelation, and to her shock, Mal had completely disappeared.

Evie’s eyes went wide as she gaped at the spot that Mal had just been. She shifted her gaze around the shore, having no idea where the other girl could have gone. Evie felt an overwhelming amount of concern come over her, because she knew that Mal would have never left her out there without a good explanation.

Evie looked around somewhat paranoidly, suddenly feeling as if she were being watched. Evie gulped a bit and raised her voice.

“Hey, if somebody’s out there, don’t look over here! I’m indecent!” Evie called out, crossing her arms over her chest as she started toward the shore. Evie looked behind her worriedly, scared that boys would materialize on the other side of the bank.

After all, that was what had happened when they were at the farm.

Evie was almost at the edge of the water when she looked up at her pile of clothes and realized that there was a strange, really odd-looking creature standing there over her clothes. Evie furrowed her brow, taking in the animal’s appearance, and her first thought was that it looked scraggly and unkempt and definitely like a big hairy rat. And she did not want a big hairy rat on her clothes.

“Shoo! Get off my clothes! Go on!” Evie scolded as she started toward the animal. It sat up straighter and she realized in surprise that it had her shirt in its paws. It looked at her fearfully and appeared that it might bolt away with the article of clothing.

Evie immediately froze, stopping in her tracks so that she didn’t further startle the animal. Evie slowly extended her arms.

“Okay, now, calm down, calm down! It’s fine, don’t run away, okay?” Evie sweetly spoke, trying to make the creature calm down and ultimately avoid it running away with her shirt. If she wasn’t careful, it would likely freak out and take her clothes with it.

“Now, you just be a good hairy rat thing, and don’t act all crazy. There’s no reason to get all scared,” Evie reassured, very slowly stepping forward in an attempt to avoid inspiring further fear.

She was getting closer and closer to the animal, and she had nearly gotten near enough to reach out and grab her shirt.

That is, until Evie heard Uma, Audrey, Mal, and Jane talking as they came tromping around the trail and through the bushes.

“Man, I just wish it would’ve been that pansy bear. I’d have taken care of that thing like a boss,” Uma expressed, looking back at the other girls. Audrey just rolled her eyes.

“I’m honestly just glad I didn’t have to go dragon,” Mal told them as she slurped loudly on her soda that she had gotten from camp, and Uma just made a dismissive sound.

“Tch. Yeah, I would’ve had that bear whooped before you could even get all that transformation smoke cleared up,” Uma confidently boasted, that usual swagger affecting her every word.

“But you didn’t before,” Audrey spoke up, and Uma didn’t quite have a response to that as they finally materialized.

At the sight of the rest of the group, the animal suddenly decided to take off. With Evie’s shirt.

“No, no, no!!! Come back, dang it!” Evie yelled, hurrying forward and shimmying into her pants as she watched the creature scurry away down shoreline.

Mal, Uma, Audrey, and Jane looked up to see Evie in only her underpants and her bra, and all except for Mal were rather shocked at the sight of Evie’s nakedness.

“Oh, my gosh! That is… Oh, my gosh!” Audrey cried, unable to articulate a full thought process as she hid her face and shielded her eyes. Uma just raised her eyebrows in surprise, but ultimately didn’t let the entire situation affect her.

“Okay… Well, nothing like practicing freedom of expression,” Uma pointed out with a shrug and a slight chuckle as Evie hopped around and worked her pants up her legs.

“Oh, this is just like _Bare and Scared_! Evie’s bare and I’m scared!” Jane fretted. Mal just ignored the rest of the group, and she stepped forward, shaking her head at her best friend as she sat her soda can down on the ground.

“What is it, E?” Mal asked easily, and Evie pointed in a direction as she zipped her pants up.

“That thing stole my shirt!” Evie announced before taking off after the animal. Mal followed Evie’s gaze and spotted the thing Evie was talking about. It was hurrying along, and it had an odd, flat tail trailing behind it.

Mal ultimately decided that she really didn’t have time to worry with what it was, and she hurried off in pursuit of the bluenette.

Uma tilted her head slightly as she took in the sight of the animal, and Audrey scoffed as she spotted the animal. Uma immediately looked at the princess, gaining the understanding that Audrey knew what the creature was.

“What?”

“That’s a beaver,” Audrey declared, and Uma nodded slowly, recognizing it from descriptions that she had heard over time about the animal.

“Wow… Are they known to steal things?” Uma questioned, watching Evie chase after the thing and turn the bend of the river with Mal not too far behind.

“Who do you think I am? Ranger Rick?” Audrey shot back, and Uma just snorted as she started to jog after the two best friends.

“C’mon, y’all, let’s go after them,” Uma told the girls, and they hurried along.

Ahead of them, Evie was quick after the beaver, and Mal was quick after Evie.

“Come back here!” Evie demanded angrily as she ran, and Mal just sighed, breathing somewhat heavily as she followed Evie.

“Evie, you’ve got plenty of other shirts back at camp! Besides, that one stinks like a skunk!” Mal explained to her, trying to touch upon some sense of rationality within Evie. Evie shook her head, continuing after the animal.

“I can wash it! Besides, I made this shirt myself!” Evie proclaimed, and Mal almost rolled her eyes in response, knowing that Evie likely had five or six more just like it back at home.

Evie continued after the beaver, and they eventually came to a structure in the water made of a bunch of mud and sticks, and it crawled up on top of the mound. Evie wasted no time in charging right after it. Mal, on the other hand, paused on the shore, and ultimately decided that she was not getting anywhere near the liquid.

“Come back!” Evie called, stepping up onto the dam, and she carefully walked across.

“E, don’t get on that, you might fall!” Mal warned worriedly, holding out a hand, but Evie didn’t listen. However, as soon as Evie thought she had the beaver cornered, it dove into the water.

“WHAT?!!! That is so cheating! Come back with my shirt, you rat!” Evie yelled, standing on top of the dam in her bra and pants.

Mal opened her mouth to call Evie back to her, but before either of them could make a move, the dam cracked and Evie fell through it suddenly. Mal screamed instinctively rushing forward, but she froze as she realized that Evie was simply stuck and her arms, torso and head was poking out of the dam.

At that point, Uma, Audrey, and Jane caught up to them. Uma stopped when she was next to Mal and Jane and Audrey stopped just short of that point. Uma furrowed her brow and froze as she took in Evie’s current issue.

Evie just gazed at the four awkwardly, and swallowed a bit.

“Umm… Do you think you guys could help me? I’m a little jammed,” Evie informed them with a self-deprecating chuckle, and Uma was pulled from her staring at the bluenette. Uma just shook her head at Evie.

“I leave y’all alone for five minutes, and she ends up in a dang beaver dam,” Uma points out with a roll of her eyes. Evie immediately looked at the pirate.

“That’s what that thing was?!” Evie cried, and Uma just sighed as she started up onto the dam.

“C’mon, Mal, let’s get her,” Uma told the faerie, and Mal suddenly looked very apprehensive as she took in the sight of the structure.

“Uh… I don’t know about that,” Mal replied, and Uma looked back at her strangely. Uma then wordlessly looked between Mal and the water, seemingly understanding what the problem was. Uma just reached a hand back to Mal.

“You ain’t falling in,” Uma assured the purple-haired girl, a softness in her voice that was not ordinarily there. Mal looked between the water and Uma, and she breathed out of her nose softly as she swallowed.

“Are you sure?” Mal asked, meeting Uma’s eyes again.

“Trust me,” Uma replied simply, and Mal looked at her for a long moment before taking her outstretched hand. Uma pulled her up and onto the dam carefully, and they very slowly started to make their way over to Evie.

After a moment of letting Uma’s tenderness hang in the air, Uma cleared her throat harshly before looking back at Mal with a smirk that didn’t quite meet her eyes that were actually filled with that earlier kindness.

“Besides, if you hit the water, I won’t let you stay in there for longer than ten minutes,” Uma quipped, and Mal rolled her eyes. Uma cracked up laughing in response as she edged along the dam toward Evie.

“Wow, that’s really reassuring,” Mal sarcastically expressed.

“Hey, hang around a little longer. It’ll be like three months of therapy for you,” Uma shot back with a grin, and Mal felt just the slightest bit lighter in this very frightening position that she found herself in.

They finally reached Evie, and Uma very carefully stepped over the hole so that she was on the other side of the bluenette.

Uma leaned down so that she was at Evie’s level, and she winced hard, coughing hard as she looked away before returning her gaze to Evie’s face.

“How you doin’?” Uma asked Evie with squinted eyes as if Evie wasn’t hung in a beaver dam with no shirt on in the middle of a river smelling like a skunk.

“Oh, I’m okay. Just hanging around,” Evie pointed out, shooting a meaningful glare at Uma that very rarely could be seen from Evie. Of course, it could likely be attributed to her embarrassment at being seen in her bra by someone that was not her best friend and sister.

Uma simply grinned widely in response to the other girl, enjoying the fire she had managed to draw from Evie despite her displeasure in regards to Evie’s current disgusting stink.

“Alright, Blue, let’s get you out of here,” Uma told her, trying to decipher how to best pull Evie out of the hole she had found herself in.

“Mal, I’ll grab one arm and you get the other one, and we’ll both pull up, okay?” Uma instructed, and Mal nodded, grabbing Evie’s right arm in her hands.

“Now, Evie, when we pull up, you start pushing up with us,” Uma directed the bluenette. Evie hummed in agreement, and Uma placed her hands in position on Evie’s left arm.

“Okay, pull!” Uma heaved along with Mal, and Evie thrust her legs. Before long, they managed to get her out of the hole just enough so that she was now sitting on the structure not too far from where Mal was standing with her legs still in the hole. Evie lifted them out and she leaned against Mal’s legs with a sigh.

“Whoo… Girl, you need to ease off them Oreos. You may not can tell where all that’s going, but man, we sure can,” Uma expressed, raising her eyebrows as she breathed deeply.

Evie just gave her a disapproving glance and squeezed Mal’s calf in her hand as she started to get up from her place sitting down.

However, as soon as Evie was standing up, there was a crack. Mal’s eyes went wide, and she grabbed Evie’s arm swiftly, wasting no time in clinging to her best friend despite how badly Evie stunk. Uma furrowed her brow, not moving as she looked around carefully.

“Uh, guys? I think the dam just cracked!” Audrey called, and Uma rolled her eyes.

“I could hear that!” Uma retorted, and she tried to pinpoint the exact location of the instability while staying as still as possible. Mal was wide-eyed and completely terrified as she suddenly grabbed onto Evie tightly. Evie wrapped her arms around Mal’s and carefully held the girl’s elbows in her hands in an attempt to comfort the faerie.

However, Mal swiftly let Evie go, wrinkling her nose in disgust as she gazed at Evie in disgust, getting a good sniff of the skunk smell that Evie was sporting.

“I think you need to get off of it! I think that cracking means it’s going to break!” Audrey pointed out worriedly.

“No kidding!”

Uma very carefully stepped forward, deciding that the only way they were going to possibly get off this thing was if they tried stepping on the dam. Uma moved around the hole and approached Mal and Evie carefully.

“Alright, y’all step real lightly, and head toward solid ground,” Uma informed them, and Evie nodded easily, prodding Mal to come along and follow her.

Evie stepped very slowly, and Mal followed along with Uma trailing after her.

They had nearly made it to the edge of the water when Mal stepped just a bit too hard, stumbling over a stick in the midst of her constant staring at the water, and the dam cracked again. Their eyes went wide and before they could do anything, the dam cracked all the way, falling apart as all three of them hit the water.

Mal screamed, and Evie yelped as they landed in the river. Uma just spluttered a bit as she landed headfirst in the liquid.

Evie was closest to the shore, so she could easily crawl upon it, but Mal in her panic immediately started flailing around in the middle of the water. Evie turned to face the other girl, her jaw slackening as she gaped in fear for Mal. Mal was so scared of water, and quite honestly it terrified Evie and hurt her for Mal to be scared.

“Mal, just swim, you know how!” Evie called, but Mal was in such a fright that she didn’t listen to Evie. Uma dove forward after Mal and easily wrapped an arm around Mal’s waist before swimming over to the shore.

As soon as Mal touched the ground, she crawled forward, relaxing on the rocks as she breathed deeply.

“M, are you okay?” Evie questioned immediately, kneeling next to Mal as she gently wiped Mal’s face with her hand. Mal just nodded and swiftly leaned away from Evie’s touch in disgust, noticing that Evie still very much smelled like skunk spray. She then looked over at the pirate that was washed up with her. Uma wiped her face free of the water that was covering it and she raised an eyebrow at Mal as she crawled over and rested next to the other girl.

Mal dipped her head in slight embarrassment, knowing that the water hadn’t actually been that deep and she actually could have simply stood up in it. She even knew how to swim. It was just that her fear of the water had just overcome her in that moment.

Mal looked back up at Uma gratefully, hoping that everything that she felt was conveyed in one gaze. Uma eyed her softly with a smile, and Mal just held the pirate’s gaze.

“See. Told you I wouldn’t let you stay in there for longer than ten minutes,” Uma shrugged nonchalantly. Mal laughed in response to the other girl, shoving Uma’s shoulder playfully, and Uma grinned widely. Evie rolled her eyes at the both of them, and squeezed Mal’s shoulders gently.

“I don’t mean to interrupt anything, but I really think we need to address the ultimate problem with this picture,” Audrey spoke up, and they looked to the pink princess, inevitably catching sight of Jane behind a tree.

“What? That Jane’s over there scratching her butt?” Uma questioned, and Jane’s eyes went wide as she froze. Audrey looked back, furrowing her brow as she looked at the fairy.

“What? Ugh, no! No, that Evie’s standing here in only a pair of pants and her bra!” Audrey pointed out, and Uma rolled her eyes as she started to get up, offering a hand to Mal as she pulled the faerie to her feet.

“C’mon, y’all, let’s go back to camp,” Uma told them, and Mal nodded easily as Audrey and Uma took the lead. Evie started to reach an arm around Mal, but Mal jumped away from the other girl, her eyes wide as she tried to avoid her smelly best friend. Evie pouted slightly, and Mal just offered Evie an apologetic smile as they went on about their way.

Jane, however, was still behind the tree.

“Yo, itchy-pants, get a move on!” Uma called with a wicked cackle, and Jane jumped in horror as she hurried after the rest of the group.

“Coming!”


	10. Enter Stink-Bomb

“Hey, guys?” Evie called from her position inside the tent as she poked her head out from inside the door.

While Evie was inside of the tent, the rest of the girls were all sitting outside and enjoying the warm air of the night. And perhaps also putting off the inevitable in that they were attempting to avoid Evie’s stink for as long as they possibly could manage. After all, Jane was the only one that seemed unbothered by the smell.

“Have any of you seen my hairbrush?” Evie questioned, and Mal looked back at her with an eyebrow raise, slurping her third soda that night.

“No, I haven’t,” Mal immediately replied and Uma as well as Audrey shook their heads as well. However, when Mal happened to catch a glimpse of Jane, the fairy didn’t seem nearly as confident as the rest of them and she in fact looked quite nervous.

“That’s odd. I specifically remember sitting it nearby my sleeping bag,” Evie acknowledged, and Jane looked very sheepish at this point.

“Well, Evie, I’ve got a confession to make,” Jane started, her hands folded on her lap as she tried to avoid looking back at Evie just yet.

“Oh, do you know where my hairbrush is?” Evie asked sweetly, tilting her head slightly as she looked at the girl in front of her sitting on the log.

“I know where it’s been,” Jane trailed off in a mumble before turning to face Evie finally.

“Evie, do you know when you have an itch somewhere on you, and you’d do anything to get rid of it?” Jane questioned, and Evie slowly nodded, taking in this statement.

“Yeah…”

“And you’re so desperate that you’d take anything to scratch it with?” Jane asked anxiously, and Evie just stared at her, all hints of a smile faded away in favor of a startlingly neutral expression.

“Where’s my brush, Jane?” Evie questioned, and Jane swallowed, fiddling with her hands.

“Well, I might… maybe possibly could have used it to scratch my poison ivy rash,” Jane murmured the end of her sentence, and Evie’s eyes went ridiculously wide. Audrey recoiled in disgust, and Mal raised both eyebrows. Uma burst into laughter as she realized precisely what had happened.

“JANE! That is hilarious!” Uma cackled joyfully, slapping her knee, and Audrey just gaped a Jane as if she had sprouted three heads.

“I promise I’ll get you a new one, Evie! I’m sorry! Please don’t be mad at me!”

“Oh, wait a minute, y’all! You know how we all figured out that Jane wears thongs?” Uma asked, and Jane looked like she could turn into a puddle of embarrassment. Audrey, however, appeared very much unembarrassed but and significantly disgusted.

“Yeah?” Mal replied, cuing Uma to continue, and Uma grinned wickedly as she uttered her next words.

“Well, I bet she thonged Evie’s brush!” Uma was at that point nearly falling off of her log in the midst of her laughter. Mal couldn’t help but laugh along with the pirate captain.

“That is so unbelievably disgusting,” Audrey expressed with a bit of a shudder as she rubbed her eyes and then ran her fingers through her hair.

“Please tell me that you at least pulled all of Evie’s hairs out of it before you used it!” Mal wheezed hard, unable to fully articulate her words in the midst of her laughing. Uma laughed even harder, leaning over on her log as she tried to keep from hitting the ground.

Evie looked rightly offended at the implication that Evie kept hairs in her brush and she shot Mal an indignant glance for suggesting such a thing.

“My hairbrush is not hairy!” Evie declared, and Mal and Uma sobered. However, as soon as they shared a glance, they were falling into stitches once again.

“Don’t worry, guys, I cleaned it out! It wasn’t that hairy!” Jane spoke up, thinking she was helping, but it really only just served to make the two Isle girls laugh even more. Audrey gagged a bit as she tried to keep the contents of her stomach where they belonged. Evie just looked even more offended at the entire ordeal.

Mal scrunched her nose as she held her stomach, and tried to calm down from all of the laughing. All of the laughing mixed with the soda that she had been guzzling was hurting it badly.

“You people just disgust me,” Audrey wholeheartedly told them, and she turned and started to get into the tent, evading Evie who was perched at the doorway of the tent. Evie scooted just a bit out of the way, but kept her head hanging out of the hole.

“Oh, boy, my stomach hurts,” Mal chuckled a bit, breathing hard as she came down from her high of laughter. Uma snorted a bit, working to regain control of herself as she stood up from the log and ambled over to the tent.

“Whoo, okay, y’all. That was funny. Man, we need to go to bed before we figure out anything else we don’t need to know,” Uma proclaimed, sniffing hard as she headed into the tent after Audrey.

Jane just eyed Evie deeply apologetically.

“I’m sorry, Evie,” Jane expressed, and Mal painedly watched as Evie mustered the greatest amount of sweetness and understanding that she could possibly put upon her face at that moment and in these circumstances.

“Oh, don’t worry, Jane. I understand why you did it, and I’m glad you told me the truth. Just… Just don’t get too close for a little while. I’m not quite sure what my hands will do without my brain’s permission,” Evie expressed with a tight smile, and Jane nodded somewhat fearfully.

Evie looked at Mal strangely, seeming to realize that Mal was not feeling well. She crawled out of the tent and headed over to Mal. As soon as Evie had left the entrance, Jane immediately took her chance and hurried inside the tent with Uma and Audrey.

Mal furrowed her brow as she tried to overcome the impending stomachache that she could feel coming on.

“M, are you okay?” Evie questioned worriedly, and Mal just looked at her quietly and stubbornly for a long moment, not wanting to admit that her stomach was hurting as Evie had claimed that it would be as a result of the soda.

“My stomach doesn’t feel so good,” Mal replied, knowing that she had to tell Evie, despite how much she didn’t want to and knew that Evie would scold her. Evie just sighed, placing her hands on her hips as she looked down at Mal with that expression that Mal had known she’d use.

“I told you it wasn’t a good idea to drink that much soda because it always ends up hurting your stomach,” Evie chastised gently, and Mal just poked her lip out in response to Evie as she started to get up. Evie sighed deeply before bending down to help Mal up. However, Mal quickly evaded Evie’s hand, remembering Evie’s stink quite well as it just oozed off of her.

“Aww, E… But it was good,” Mal tried to look as sweet and sad and innocent as possible, and Evie just eyed Mal affectionately as they headed for the tent.

Mal crawled in first and hit the sleeping bag carefully, letting out a deep breath as she closed her eyes. Evie came in nearby her, following along as she stepped over Uma.

“Enter Stink-bomb,” Uma serenely spoke, and Evie looked over at her with an eyebrow raise. Uma just grinned, offering the peace sign with all of the snark that she could possibly muster.

Evie ultimately decided to ignore her, and she sat down close to Mal. However, after a moment, she looked at Mal’s sleeping bag longingly, wishing that she could join her best friend as had been the custom since they started going on trips that required a sleeping bag.

Mal had closed her eyes, but she suddenly felt someone staring at her. Mal cracked one eye open, holding onto her stomach as she tried to calm the pressure upon it. To her mild surprise, Evie was just sitting there and looking at her longingly. Mal offered Evie an apologetic look.

“E, you can’t get into my sleeping bag with me. My stomach’s hurting way too badly and you stink way too much,” Mal told the other girl, and Evie poked her lip out a bit somewhat sadly. After a long moment of this, Mal finally reached over and placed her hand on Evie’s in an attempt to comfort her at least just a little.

Audrey was already snuggled in her sleeping bag, and her breathing was starting to shift to a steadier rhythm that would indicate that she was working heavily upon going to sleep. Of course, Audrey could go to sleep anywhere at astounding speeds.

“Your stomach’s hurting? Well, now, didn’t Evie tell you to not to drink soda?” Uma questioned with a wicked smile. Mal narrowed her eyes in a glare as she looked to the pirate. Uma didn’t seem affected by Mal’s irritation in the least, and it actually if anything seemed to please her slightly.

“Do you guys think we should see if the internet status has changed and if we can text the guys?” Jane questioned suddenly, and Uma glanced over at the other girl before lifting her phone up to check it. After a moment, she turned the screen to face Jane so the other girl could see it.

“It’s on roam,” Uma informed the other girl, and Jane nodded, her lips pursed as she took in the fact.

“Besides, I’m not much in the mood for a conversation right now anyway,” Uma told the other girl, folding her arms behind her head as she relaxed and started to close her eyes with a deep sigh.

Evie looked over to Mal, and she noticed that the other girl was looking quite pained indeed. Her lips were a thin line, and Evie very unfortunately knew what was coming. Evie prepared herself to breathe lightly.

They sat there in silence for a little while, and Audrey was now breathing heavily as she slept deeply as per her usual. Uma even looked much more relaxed, but Evie could tell that she wasn’t quite asleep yet. Jane was looking at her phone somewhat drowsily, and Evie was just sitting there, waiting for the disaster that was surely about to come as soon as the anticipated occurred.

Soon enough, it happened.

“Oh, my--- what _is_ that?!” Uma suddenly declared as she furrowed her brow, shooting up in her sleeping bag as she looked around and sniffed hard. After a moment, she gagged hard, and covered her nose. Evie just held her tongue as she tried really hard not to giggle at Uma’s expense. After all, it smelled really bad in there since they didn’t have just skunk smell circulating, and she didn’t want to breathe any more than she had to.

“Have mercy, that is killing me! That is--- EW!” Uma disgustedly announced, and Mal and Evie shared a glance. Mal looked quite guilty indeed, and Evie valiantly attempted to avoid laughing at Uma. She instead tried to center her mind around her pain for Mal.

“That is POTENT!!!” Uma yelled, coughing as she tried to get the smell out of her nose.

All of a sudden, Audrey snorted hard, waking up, and Uma looked over at the princess in shock. Audrey never woke up from sleep that early and easily even with yelling.

“Oh, my gosh, what is that?! Evie didn’t smell that bad before I fell asleep!” Audrey cried.

“Dang, that ain’t no skunk stink! That’s a fart!” Uma proclaimed loudly, and Jane just nodded in agreeance as she covered her face with her hands. Mal was almost laughing at this point, and Evie was as well.

“Oh, gosh, are you sure? It smells like something died!” Audrey replied, coughing hard.

“Heckfire, I know a fart when I smell one!”

“Don’t worry, girls, you eventually get used to it. Your sense of smell will slowly deteriorate to compensate for the sudden overload to your nostrils,” Evie very calmly told them, and Mal snorted against her will, and Evie just smiled slightly down at her best friend.

The three on the other side of the tent all turned their gazes to Mal, and their eyes widened.

“MAL!!! You are horrid! You woke me up out of a dead sleep!!!” Audrey cried, and Mal finally laughed despite her slight embarrassment surrounding the entire ordeal. Evie tried really hard to be as serious as she could manage because she didn’t particularly want to laugh and accidentally breathe in more of the smell than she had to.

Uma hacked, trying desperately to get the scent out of her nose.

“Aw, man, I can’t sleep in here like this. I’m out!” Uma declared, sitting up and grabbing a corner of her sleeping bag as she started to try to get out of the tent.

After a few moments, she finally unzipped the flap, and her jaw slackened as she came face to face with several raccoons. They all stared at her in shock until she suddenly started shouting at the creatures.

“GET OUT OF OUR FOOD, YOU DIRTY TRASH PANDAS!!!” Uma shrieked, and they all scattered. Uma tromped out of the tent, but her foot caught on the bottom of the tent and she fell down on her knees. Uma grunted in pain and she carefully raised up as she growled under her breath in irritation. She took her sleeping bag and flopped it down on the dusty ground nearby, and she started to kneel and lay down on it.

“Dadgum it, those danged trash pandas and that danged farting moron in the tent and that danged skunked blue bozo and my danged knees,” Uma muttered underneath her breath, complaining all the while as she finally flopped down on her sleeping bag heavily.

“Uma, you’re sleeping outside?!” Audrey cried, and Uma rolled her eyes, wondering how the princess managed to miss that fact.

“Yep,” Uma replied simply as she snuggled into her pillow. Audrey peered out of the tent opening to look at Uma.

“Aren’t you afraid of getting eaten by a bear? What if it comes back?” Jane nervously questioned.

“Well, I’m dead, I reckon. It’s better than living with that smell in my nose,” Uma informed her simply.

“I for one am never going to sleep outside, thank you so very much. I am not some sort of… hobo,” Audrey proclaimed, and Uma rolled her eyes.

There were several moments of quiet before Audrey suddenly shrieked and coughed and nearly gagged. Mal started laughing again a bit, and Audrey came stomping over.

“But I’m a hobo tonight!!!”


	11. Queen of the S.S. Care Bear

When Mal opened her eyes, the first thing that occurred to her was that there was a horrendously annoying animal noise sounding off nearby the tent. She squinted hard, looking over in the direction that it was coming from. It sounded like it was right outside the canvas.

Mal looked to her side and was immediately greeted with Evie’s peacefully sleeping face as she laid as close to Mal as she could get without touching Mal or Mal’s sleeping bag. Mal smiled slightly at the sight of her best friend, but she quickly turned more solemn as she sat up carefully and made the decision to go and look for the source of the sound that had been going off constantly.

Mal made sure that she very carefully and explicitly avoided disturbing Evie as she stepped over the bluenette’s legs. Mal made her way out of the tent flap, and she almost laughed as she realized that Uma, Audrey, and Jane were all lying outside on the dirt in their sleeping bags.

Mal suddenly heard the noise start up again, and she looked over in the direction that it was originating. Mal narrowed her eyes a bit as she realized it was a tiny baby bird. Mal raised her eyebrows and she headed over to the small creature.

“What in the world is that racket?” Uma demanded suddenly, and Mal paused, looking around to face the other girl. Uma was blearily rubbing at her eyes and trying to spot the source of the sound.

“Come here and look, Uma,” Mal whispered, and Uma shook her head, sitting up in her sleeping bag sluggishly and slowly getting to her feet. She then ambled over to see what Mal was looking at so intently.

After only a moment, she spotted the small bird as well as she sidled up to the dragon queen.

They shared a long moment of silence before Uma leaned over to Mal a bit with a grin.

“Want some breakfast?” Uma questioned slyly with a giant smile, and Mal just glared at her in a scold.

“Uma!” Mal reprimanded, and Uma just snickered at her own joke as she looked down at the little bird.

“It must have fell from the tree.”

“That’s where most birds come from,” Uma replied simply, and Mal just looked at the pirate with narrowed eyes. Uma smiled and Mal noticed that she just seemed much more aware than she was just a few moments ago.

“Wow. You’re full of yourself this morning,” Mal commented as she backed away a little in an attempt to see if she could spot a nest in the branches above. Uma just shrugged as she followed suit, seeing if she could help Mal in her efforts.

“Well, if I’m not full of myself, who else am I going to be full of?” Uma shot back with a chuckle, and Mal rolled her eyes, enjoying her and Uma’s banter. They didn’t get to spend much time with just the two of them by themselves, and Mal did treasure those few moments they had together.

“Hey, I think I see a wad of twigs up there. That’s probably the little joker’s nest,” Uma pointed out as she lifted a hand to show Mal specifically where she had spotted the object in the tree. Mal leaned a bit closer to Uma to follow her finger, and she quickly saw the nest up in the tree.

“Okay… Well, you give me a boost, and let’s put it back in its nest,” Uma told the faerie quietly as she started to reach down for the baby bird. They had been making sure to keep their voices hushed so that the lighter sleepers of their group didn’t awaken.

Mal just stared at Uma, completely unimpressed, and Uma looked back at Mal as she almost took the bird. She raised an eyebrow at the faerie, and she paused in her grabbing of the bird.

“What?” Uma questioned.

“You know I can’t give you a boost,” Mal informed the pirate factually. Uma looked her up and down and noted that Mal did look rather scrawny and ill-equipped to pick anyone up. Of course, Mal always looked that way, but Uma was so used to it that she didn’t ordinarily notice.

“C’mon, call out a little bit of that dragon. Y’know. Like you did when you were trying to cheat at arm-wrestling,” Uma acknowledged nonchalantly, biting her bottom lip a bit as she tried to avoid cracking up laughing while she kneeled over and rested her elbows on her knees in her squatted position. Mal just narrowed her eyes at the pirate.

“Now, who cheated and won?” Mal sent back in response.

“Now, who started the cheating?” Uma finished with a pointed gaze, and Mal just allowed a slight grin.

“Touché,” Mal replied breezily, and Uma shrugged.

“I try.” Uma then reached down and took the bird in her hands gently. It immediately started screaming even louder than it was before, and Uma almost dropped it in the midst of her surprise.

She looked at Mal, lost and somewhat shocked, and Mal shook her head quickly.

“Here, give it to me, and boost me up!” Mal quickly instructed, and Uma handed the bird over to Mal swiftly before kneeling down and locking her hands together to help Mal up. Mal held the bird in one hand and took Uma’s shoulder firmly in her free one as she stepped onto Uma’s hands.

Suddenly, as Mal was just starting to get boosted up, they heard a loud screeching from above. They both looked up, and they spotted two birds flying overhead. Mal looked down at Uma worriedly, and Uma offered the barest of smiles.

“Must be Mommy and Daddy Bird,” Uma pointed out, and Mal nodded somewhat nervously. She wasn’t particularly scared of birds, but she knew what the rage of a protective parent could do.

Mal started to raise the baby bird toward the nest, and she jumped a bit as one of the birds swooped down and tried to attack her. Mal couldn’t help but yelp as it got too close for comfort.

“Hurry it up!” Uma cried, and Mal realized that another had divebombed Uma. Mal tried to put the little bird back as the attacks started to increase. But she couldn’t quite reach the nest.

“I can’t put it in!” Mal yelled, and she ducked as a bird buzzed her head and actually managed to pull her hair.

“Why the heck not?!” Uma replied loudly, completely foregoing any attempts at being quiet and avoiding disturbing the others. As a result of this, Audrey started to raise up in her sleeping bag, the two of them somehow managing to miraculously disturb the unwakeful princess.

“Because I can’t reach!” Mal shot back, and Uma tried to boost Mal a little higher as she suddenly felt a sharp pain at the skin on her elbow.

“OW! Dang things!!!” Uma yelped, and Audrey looked over at the two. It only took her a moment to realize that there were birds involved in the insanity that Mal and Uma were currently engaged in, and

“AAAHHH!!!!! BIRDS!!!!” Audrey screeched, and she jumped backwards, landing on Jane. Jane was already starting to wake up, but when Audrey landed on her, she was fully awakened, and she coughed hard.

“Audrey!” the daughter of the Fairy Godmother wheezed, and Audrey quickly got up, running for the tent for refuge from the attacks. She was positively terrified of everything avian.

“What is going on out here?!” Evie called as she started to step out of the tent and looked in the direction of the commotion. However, as soon as Evie had spotted Mal and Uma and realized what they were doing, Audrey crashed into her, and they both fell inside the tent.

“Just a little higher, Uma!”

“Higher, my butt! Or maybe I should say your butt, because let me tell you, you’re heavier than you look like, Mal!” Uma complained loudly, but she tried to lift Mal to a greater elevation. Mal grabbed onto the branch and tried to lift herself up a bit more.

“Y’know, it’s a good thing you don’t have Evie’s Oreo butt, because this’d be really hard right now!” Uma ground out painfully as a bird flew shockingly close to her face.

Mal reached up and extended her arm, placing the baby bird in the nest carefully. Mal sighed deeply in relief as she smiled at the little creature that was finally back where it belonged.

“OWWW!” Uma cried, and Mal suddenly found that Uma wasn’t holding her up anymore, and Mal scrambled to hang onto the branch. She looked down, realizing that Uma had fallen to the ground on her butt and was grasping at her left eye.

“M! M, just hang on!” Evie suddenly called out loudly as she went hurrying as fast as she could over to where Mal was hanging from the tree. Mal clung onto it tightly.

“I’m trying, E!” Mal replied, and after only a moment, Evie was directly under the faerie, reaching up toward Mal’s legs.

“Okay, M, slowly lower yourself down from the branch!” Evie instructed, and Mal loosened her grip from the tree and she felt Evie’s arms wrapping around her lower half carefully.

“Now let go. I’ve got you,” Evie told the other girl, and Mal ducked swiftly as one of the birds came to try to attack.

“Are you sure?”

“Yes, I’ve got you,” Evie assured her, and Mal took a deep breath before letting go of the branch. Before she knew it, she was falling, and Evie had fallen as well. Mal landed directly on top of Evie, her chest crashing against Evie’s. For a long moment, they both just rested there in that position, breathing deeply as they tried to regain the air that was knocked from their lungs.

Mal finally opened her eyes to look at Evie, and Evie’s gaze shifted to meet Mal’s. Evie offered a small guilty smile.

“Hi, how ya doin’?” Mal questioned as if it were the most normal moment in the world. Evie just moved her head in a gesture that mocked a shrug.

“I’m doing rather swell,” Evie responded simply, and Mal smiled at her sweetly as she scrunched her nose at her best friend.

“Well, that’s just peachy,” Mal replied before promptly rolling off of the bluenette so that she was lying on the dirt next to Evie.

“And, by the way, thank you, Uma, for letting me just hang in there and fall,” Mal sarcastically expressed gratitude to the pirate. Uma was rubbing heavily at her eye, and at that statement, Uma’s uncovered eye immediately snapped to Mal’s gaze.

“What? Evie dropped you!” Uma defensively cried.

“Maybe, but at least she tried to keep me from falling,” Mal replied, squeezing her sister’s shoulder as she sat up. Evie just smiled widely as she looked at Mal adoringly.

“Look, them birds tried to stab my eyeball out!” Uma cried, barely pulling her hand away from her eye before rubbing it again. Uma happened to look at her shoulder with her eye that she wasn’t nursing, and she furrowed her brow.

“And I think they left a present for me,” Uma added as she rolled her lip up in disgust.

“Well? Are you blind?” Mal questioned, and Uma just rolled her eyes at Mal before very slowly and hesitantly uncovering her eye. She barely opened it, and at that moment, Audrey leaned out of the tent.

“Are they gone?” Audrey questioned hesitantly, and Uma’s gaze settled upon the princess.

“Aw, man, my eye’s back in order, and the first thing I see is that?!” Uma wailed dramatically, and Mal almost laughed at the pirate as Audrey looked horribly and awfully offended.

“Maybe the birds should’ve stabbed it out. It would’ve gone with your pirate look you try to mimic,” Audrey pointed out smarmily, and Uma pointed at the princess.

“Look, I’m the pirate captain and queen, and don’t you forget it, Princess,” Uma shot back as she gave her eye one last rub.

“What were you two doing out here anyway? Incensing the local wildlife?” Audrey questioned, rolling her eyes as she exited the tent. Jane sat up from her position on her sleeping bag, risking getting up after all of the commotion.

“No, Smarty-Pants, _rescuing_ the local wildlife,” Uma corrected, getting to her feet and extending her hands to help Mal and Evie up. They both took them and were pulled upright.

“Rescuing?”

“We just put a baby bird back in its nest,” Mal clarified as Evie gently picked a twig from Mal’s hair.

“Personally, I wanted to eat it, but Mal insisted that we didn’t,” Uma added, trying to make herself sound less soft in this story. Audrey immediately narrowed her eyes and grinned almost evilly. Uma closed her eyes, knowing where this was going.

“Saving baby birds? Sounds like you’re going soft, Miss Pirate Captain Queen thing,” Audrey pointed out with a bit of a laugh, using Uma’s self-proclaimed title against her. Uma groaned.

“What’s her name?! Uma! The Grand Queen and Captain of the S.S. Care Bear!!!” Audrey cackled, and Uma was immediately working to defend herself from that name, sincerely afraid it would stick judging by Audrey’s wicked expression.

“First, my ship is _The Lost Revenge_. None of that ridiculous S.S. crap. And secondly, I did _not_ save the mini drumstick. Mal did,” Uma stuck to her story firmly, and Audrey just looked almost giddy at the fact that she had actually managed to get the better of Uma for once.

“You boosted her up,” Audrey acknowledged.

“At her request.”

“But that still makes you soft.”

“How?”

“Because you cared about what she wanted enough to actually help her with it when you weren’t gaining anything from it,” Jane finished with a big smile, and Evie wrapped her arms around Mal’s shoulders and pressed the side of her head to the side of Mal’s. Mal brought a hand up and squeezed Evie’s arm affectionately.

Audrey gestured to Jane with a smile, and Uma growled under her breath, cutting her eyes at Jane. Jane somewhat shrunk beneath the pirate’s hard gaze.

“Whatever,” Uma replied simply, and Audrey giggled like a madwoman as she looked over at Jane, Mal, and Evie excitedly. The latter two eyed Uma in something between amusement and sympathy while Jane was trying to surreptitiously slip away to the nearest tree.

“She doesn’t even deny it!” Audrey pointed out, purely thrilled with her supposed victory. Uma just scoffed a bit as she looked up at the tree, turning away from the rest of the girls.

“Well… I guess I now know which tree to avoid for my booby trap,” Uma pointed out, and all four of the other girls’ gazes snapped to Uma.

“Booby trap?!” Jane squeaked, and the other girls were just standing with their jaws slackened in surprise. Uma looked back at the rest of them with a look of seeming nonchalance but intense mischief just beneath the surface.

“Yeah. After all, can’t stop those raccoons without a booby trap.”

Mal and Evie slowly looked at each other, dread mirrored on one another’s faces.

Well… It was certainly going to be an eventful afternoon. And if the determined look in Uma’s eyes was anything to go by, it would likely promise to be an eventful night as well.


	12. Of Booby Traps and Accidents

“Uma, what in the world possesses you to come up with these ridiculous ideas?” Audrey demanded as she glared up at Uma in the tree above her.

Uma just grinned widely in response to Audrey’s bellyaching, and continuing tying the vine she had found, trying to organize her booby trap perfectly.

The girls had all visited the berry patch and gathered some breakfast after the heist of last night. And now Uma was up in a tree that was opposite of the bird tree but just as close to the girls’ tent. She was trying to tie together a booby trap that would work to perhaps catch some raccoons. Uma had been driven insane by these creatures, and she had enough of their evil works in stealing their food.

So, Uma was now going to catch them once and for all.

“Firstly, they aren’t ridiculous. Secondly, I’m a genius, and you need to realize that,” Uma replied and Audrey just huffed, narrowing her eyes a bit.

“Shouldn’t you have a bra up there?” Evie questioned suddenly, and Uma furrowed her brow before looking down at the bluenette. Evie just returned her gaze patiently, and Uma raised an eyebrow.

“Why in the heck would I have a bra up here?” Uma asked finally after a long moment, and Mal chuckled a bit.

“Because it’s a booby trap,” Mal explained with a slight smirk, and Evie offered Mal a sweet smile before shifting her gaze back to Uma. Uma pursed her lips, considering this for a long moment before she grinned at Evie in a manner that could only be described as evilly.

“You’re right. I need a bra. Give it up, Genevieve,” Uma called, and Evie’s eyes widened as she realized what she was going to have to do.

“Wait a minute, Uma, I honestly don’t think a bra is necessary for a booby trap! I was mostly joking when I said that!” Evie clarified, glancing between Mal and Uma desperately as she mentally begged for someone to save her from the upcoming torture.

“Throw it up!” Uma called, and Evie looked at Mal desperately. Mal just shrugged, honestly not sure what she thought of the whole thing but deciding that it would be interesting to see what Uma did with the bra.

Evie just sighed in resignation before starting to work the thing off underneath her shirt. Audrey’s eyes widened in complete and utter horror, and Jane covered her eyes quickly. Mal just rolled her eyes, knowing that Evie had mastered the art of taking off a bra underneath her shirt, and she honestly wasn’t worried about seeing anything she didn’t want to.

After a moment, Evie produced her bra and stepped up to the tree, getting on her tiptoes, and offered it to Uma. Uma smiled widely as she leaned down and took the clothing from Evie. She gave it an experimental stretch, and nodded in approval at its elasticity.

Mal just huffed as Evie came back to stand next to her, and she raised an eyebrow as she noticed that Jane and Audrey still looked positively horrified.

“Well, dang, girls! Would you two quit acting like you’ve never seen boobs before?! All of us have them and it’s not nearly as weird as you act like it is!” Mal proclaimed, glancing between Jane and Audrey. Audrey turned her face away from the two VK best friends.

“That’s just indecent exposure! And I have had enough of having to look at Evie’s… everything!!!” Audrey cried indignantly, referencing yesterday’s situation with the beaver and Evie’s missing shirt.

“It’s under a shirt!” Mal declared in defense of her best friend, and Uma finally rolled her eyes and spoke her piece.

“Oh, get a grip, Princess, tatas in the wind ain’t no biggie,” Uma stopped as she looped Evie’s bra around a branch and tried to secure another part of her trap. Uma then turned to face Audrey with a wide grin, and Audrey eyed her skeptically.

“In fact, half of the time, I run around with no bra,” Uma pointed out, and Audrey gasped in something between mortification and absolute disgust.

“That is TMI! T-M-I!!!” Audrey cried, and Uma rolled her eyes, choosing to ignore the princess as she attempted desperately to loop Evie’s bra around another branch so it could possibly trap a raccoon.

“Can I have my bra back? I feel a little strange,” Evie spoke, and Uma waved her away dismissively.

“No, I need it! For my booby trap!”

“I kind of need it for a booby trap, too, though, in a sense,” Evie pleaded a bit, and Uma pulled hard against the branch from her position in the tree.

“Truly _amazingly_ , I think I need it,” Uma paused still pulling hard against the bra as she grunted, “even more than you!”

However, all of a sudden, the bra slipped out of her hand and was catapulted far off in the midst of the trees. Everyone froze, Evie looking after her flyaway bra longingly and Uma just staring in shock.

“Well, I guess we know what it’d do to a raccoon now! Cool!” Uma grinned widely as she nodded in approval, and Evie came to life, taking action now that she really realized what had happened.

“Uma, that was the only bra I have!” Evie whined, and Uma raised an eyebrow before shrugging in response to the entire situation.

“Huh. You should’ve planned that one better. Yo, Audrey, hand yours up here,” Uma beckoned, extending a hand as she flexed her fingers. Audrey’s mouth fell open as she gaped at the pirate.

“WHAT?!”

“Come on, now, don’t be stingy. Your lacy ones ain’t as good as Evie’s stretch-and-shoots, but it’ll have to do in a pinch,” Uma acknowledged, and Audrey crossed her arms over her chest firmly as she shot Uma a dirty look.

“I do _not_ wear lacy bras!” Audrey proclaimed, and Uma raised an eyebrow as she looked back at the princess with a smirk.

“Oh, I’ve been through your underwear drawer. One would think that you’re secretly a Victoria’s Secret model,” Uma pointed out, and Audrey let out some noise of strangled disgust and horror.

“UGH!!!”

“It’s okay, Auds. I’m sure Mal might offer up her bra,” Evie told Audrey in an attempt to be reassuring as she stepped toward the pink princess. Audrey jumped back away from Evie, and she glanced between Evie and Mal in horror. She was already disgusted by Evie’s lack of a bra, and she couldn’t even begin to imagine how horrid it would be if Mal didn’t have one on either.

“Okay! If we have to have a bra---”

“We do,” Uma immediately interjected. Audrey rolled her eyes.

“If we have to have a bra despite the fact that it’s not really in the definition of a booby trap at all, I will go and get Evie’s. I will not stand here and let every one of us lose perfectly good bras and expose my eyes to things they do not need to see!” Audrey proclaimed before stomping off into the woods.

“Thank you, Audrey!” Evie called after the princess. Audrey just grumbled something in return, and Evie then looked back up at Uma.

“I give her five minutes before she runs back screaming,” Uma voiced her thoughts aloud, and Mal shrugged, figuring that wasn’t entirely inaccurate. After all, Audrey was anything but outdoorsy. However, when she put her mind to something, Audrey was not easily discouraged from it.

“Well, I certainly hope not. The only bra I have is gone and she’s the only chance I have of getting it back. And now I feel _really_ strange,” Evie pointed out, an odd sound in her voice.

“How so?” Mal questioned, squeezing Evie’s hand a bit and Evie looked over at Mal, her brow furrowed in thought.

“Well… I kind of feel like a hippie. All loose… And free,” Evie replied finally, and Mal snorted in response to the other girl.

“We ain’t having no hippies around here. Go bra-peddling or something,” Uma told her, barely holding back the laugh in her voice as she tried to work her trap a bit. Evie thought about this statement for a moment, and then she quickly turned to Mal.

“M, can I borrow a bra?” Evie questioned sweetly. Mal opened her mouth to reply, but before she could do so, Uma interrupted quickly.

“You seriously asked Mal for a bra? Girl, them things ain’t fitting in that small of a space,” Uma announced, snickering, and Mal glared at the pirate. Evie almost looked embarrassed, but also looked slightly amused at the statement. However, she knew better than getting much humor out of the entire ordeal. After all, Mal wasn’t too happy right now about Uma’s statement.

Uma turned to grin at the two of them with that smug expression for which she was so infamous before returning her eyes to her work. She just had to get the enjoyment out of the effect of her words.

They were quiet for a long moment, but before too long, Uma finally spoke up.

“And, Jane, quit scratching your butt on my booby trap tree,” Uma stated aloud, gazing down at the fairy that was at the base of the tree on the opposite side to Mal and Evie. Jane jumped, embarrassed that she was caught, and she hurried away from the tree.

Meanwhile, Audrey was currently wandering through the woods in the general direction that the bra had flown.

So far, she had not had any success in finding the darned thing, and she quite honestly believed that it might be a hopeless cause. After all, she was already out of earshot of the other girls by now, and that fact did not make her feel particularly comfortable. She was getting farther from camp, and while she didn’t feel she would get lost, she certainly didn’t want to test her confidence surrounding that subject.

She continued further, though, her driving force being how much she didn’t want to have to deal with Uma’s fussing and Evie’s nakedness and the potential for another of their numbers to lose a good bra.

“EW!” Audrey cried suddenly as she wiped her face hard, trying to rid herself of the spider web that had wrapped itself all over her features. She squinted hard as she tried to rid the stickiness from her face, and she shook her head furiously.

“Oh, that’s so disgusting!” Audrey proclaimed to herself as she cast an unappreciative glance toward the general area that she had picked up the spider web. She allowed herself a shudder before continuing along through the trees in an attempt to find the bra.

Audrey hurried a bit faster through the trees, hoping she’d find what she was looking for. So far, all she had seen was bushes, trees, and the spider web, and that had been the extent of her list of variety.

She stepped around a very large rock, and to her utmost relief, Audrey finally spotted something bright blue lying on the ground.

However, to her utmost terror, there was something coiled and nasty-looking resting on the bright blue.

Audrey’s eyes went wide as she found herself looking into the eyes of a snake. Audrey was frozen for a long time, and her mouth worked as she couldn’t quite speak or scream any words.

It hissed a bit as it stared her down, and Audrey finally let loose with a strangled noise of distress and managed to get her legs to work. Audrey had almost managed to work a scream out of herself as she took off in the opposite direction, looking behind her at the snake.

“No, no, get away from me! HELP---”

Audrey was swiftly brought to a halt both in her vocalization and her running when she crashed headfirst directly into a tree. Audrey immediately saw black and she lost all consciousness.

About thirty minutes later, the other girls were getting really worried about her.

“Well… It’s been way more than five minutes,” Evie offhandedly pointed out, and Mal furrowed her brow as she carefully studied the part of the forest where Audrey had gone off into.

Mal barely managed to catch sight of Uma’s worried look before she masked it with that familiar ease with which she addressed everything.

“Well, I’ll bet you ten bucks she’s lost,” Uma proclaimed, and Mal and Evie just shared a concerned glance.

“Eh, let’s go save her rear end. She’s probably out there terrified she’ll never get the chance to see good wifi ever again before the trees close in and eat her or something,” Uma chuckled to herself, and Mal couldn’t quite find it inside of herself to laugh with the pirate. She was entirely too worried. Mal had a bad feeling about this, and as Evie suddenly latched onto her arm with a tightness unusual to the bluenette, Mal could feel that she wasn’t the only one.

Of course, Uma’s concern and willing volunteering to go and look for the princess was rather telling in of itself.

‘C’mon, Itchy,” Uma called, and Jane emerged from behind a tree, hurrying behind the rest of the group with a glowing red face.

Uma headed the pack, the lot of them calling for the pink princess loudly as they tromped and stomped through the woods. It was particularly worrisome for the girls when Audrey continued to fail in answering their yells.

“YO! PRINCESS?!!!” Uma bellowed loudly, cupping her hands around her mouth as she tried to get a response out of the other girl. She paused for a moment, listening carefully, and she furrowed her brow in worry as she noted that Audrey was obviously not hearing anything they were saying. Which meant either something happened to her or she was further in the forest than they thought. However, the pirate attempted desperately to remain optimistic and avoid thinking the worst.

“Let’s go. She’s got to be around somewhere,” Uma spoke quietly before loudly yelling again as she attempted to somehow get the princess’s attention.

“M, you remember that story Uma told the first night we came?” Evie tentatively questioned as she walked close by Mal, holding her arm gently as her brushed Mal’s frequently. Mal raised an eyebrow, looking over at the other girl.

“Yeah. Why?”

“Well… what if Jimbo got Audrey?” Evie asked somewhat worriedly. Mal huffed, rolling her eyes a little as she scanned the forest.

“Evie, Jimbo did not get Audrey,” Mal replied to her best friend. Evie just shook her head slightly.

“I don’t know, M. Are you sure?” Evie asked, and Mal nodded simply in response.

“I promise. She’s fine. When we find her, there won’t be a hair on her head harmed by an axe or anything of the kind. Heck, she probably won’t even be bleeding,” Mal told Evie, and Mal was not sure if she was trying to reassure Evie or herself at this point. Mal didn’t believe in Jimbo, but she certainly was worried that something could have hurt Audrey.

“Guys! Guys, I found her!” Jane suddenly called, and before Mal could even begin to respond, Uma took off at the speed of light in the direction that Jane was calling from. Mal and Evie wasted no time in hurrying after Uma.

Mal and Evie reached the area where Jane and Uma were, and their eyes went wide as they saw Uma on the ground. As they got closer, they realized Audrey was lying there on the ground.

Audrey had a huge lump on her head and it had been bleeding. Her forehead had long trails of blood that had dripped down to the side of her head, and she was resting on the dirt, unconscious.

Mal’s stomach clenched as Uma started trying to shake Audrey awake.

“Princess? Princess?! Audrey, come on!” Uma insisted, grabbing Audrey’s shoulders and trying to pull her from her unconscious state.

Uma hesitantly reached up and she grabbed Audrey’s face, turning her head and inspecting the girl carefully. She then gently smacked Audrey’s cheeks in an attempt to wake the princess.

“Audrey, you better be alright, dang it. Wake up!”

“Dadgum it, Audrey, wake up! You better be alright, Princess,” Uma proclaimed in irritation, but she ultimately seemed more upset and scared than anything. Jane looked as if she might cry, and Evie’s grip had tightened on Mal as they looked at the moment unfolding before them.

“We better not have to go to the hospital because of you. I don’t like them white coats nearly as much as you apparently do,” Uma told her, still trying to make Audrey wake up, but starting to realize that she wasn’t going to.

“That better not happen, Princess. We can’t do this trip without you, Audrey,” Uma admitted somewhat sadly as she realized that they were likely going to have to take Audrey to the hospital since she was not waking up from her unconscious state. It made Uma sick to see Audrey there on the ground so hopeless and knocked out.

“Y’know, I won’t have anyone to pester or anyone that drives me insane. I need you to wake up. And… I need you here, Audrey,” Uma admitted. For a long moment, she watched Audrey’s face. However, after not too much later, she assumed that Audrey wasn’t going to get up, and they needed to get her help.

Uma looked back to Mal, moving her head in a gesture that signaled for the other girl to help Uma with Audrey.

Mal started toward them, but before she had even barely left Evie’s side, Audrey’s face lit up with a grin as her eyes barely opened. Uma’s eyes widened as she looked down at the other girl.

“You do care,” Audrey pointed out somewhat groggily. Uma blubbered for just a moment before reaching forward and shoving Audrey’s shoulder as she made a noise of pure irritation.

“I hate you! Dang it, I hate you!” Uma proclaimed loudly, and Audrey laughed as she looked at the pirate. Uma complained for just a moment and as Audrey arose to a sitting position, Uma grabbed Audrey in a tight hug.

Audrey’s eyes widened at the sudden affection, and her arms were a bit limp for a moment, unsure of what to do. However, after only a moment, she grabbed Uma firmly with an arm and used her other one to support herself.

“Are you okay?” Uma questioned, and Audrey nodded.

“I’m fine. I’ve got a headache that beats all and my forehead’s sore, but I’m fine,” Audrey replied reassuringly, really enjoying Uma’s embrace. But before she could enjoy it much longer, Uma pulled back.

“Good. Because I’m going to kill you,” Uma proclaimed, and Audrey just rolled her eyes at the pirate. Uma stood up and offered her hand to the princess. Audrey took it easily, and Uma pulled her to her feet.

“Audrey, I’m so glad you’re okay!” Jane called as she hurried forward and grabbed Audrey tightly. Mal and Evie came over and grabbed Audrey as well. Audrey just smiled a bit as she enjoyed the attention she was receiving.

“I’m glad you’re okay,” Uma admitted after they all had released Audrey. Audrey smiled at the pirate softly. They shared a long gaze before Evie suddenly cried out.

“Hey, look! My bra!”


	13. Caught in a Trap

“Y’know, I personally think it’d be really cool if that lump on your head had magical qualities.”

“How many times do I have to tell you? You can’t extract magic by bonking your head into a tree.”

“Well, I don’t think that’s true, because it’s magically distracting me from the rest of your face,” Uma pointed out with a laugh, and Audrey rolled her eyes, unimpressed with the pirate.

It was now nighttime, and the group of the girls were all relaxing inside the tent, despite Evie’s leftover skunk stink. They all decided they could handle Evie’s smell as long as Mal didn’t stink along with her.

Plus, the other four had silently agreed that they would prefer Audrey to lie down.

“Mal, tell her, would you?” Audrey looked at the girl helplessly, and Mal raised an eyebrow.

“My dog’s not in this fight,” Mal simply replied, holding up her hands defensively as Evie laughed in response to the girl. Mal smiled over at her best friend as she returned her arms to their folded position behind her head.

“Coward,” Uma shot at her, but Mal could tell the pirate didn’t mean the words as she spoke as she leaned back on her sleeping bag. Uma sighed deeply and closed her eyes for a moment.

“Man, I’ve got a long night ahead of me,” Uma spoke her thoughts aloud, and Mal was immediately brought to the thought of what was hanging in the tree just outside.

When they had gotten back, Uma had made the finishing touches on her booby trap and Evie’s bra was unfortunately a part of it as well. It was frighteningly locked and loaded and when Uma showcased it to them, they were all appropriately terrified. She even had a giant stick with which to beat her prey for good measure.

“Are you sure that thing’s even going to work?” Audrey questioned, and Uma just waved a hand dismissively at the princess.

“Of course. What kind of fantasy world are you living in?” Uma replied with an ask of her own, and Audrey just wordlessly raised an eyebrow in reply.

“So? Are y’all gonna stay up with me?” Uma asked, and Audrey scoffed.

“Unlike you, some of us actually value sleep,” the princess shot back, and Uma just sighed a bit.

“Sleep is overrated,” Uma informed, and Evie just chuckled under her breath at the statement. Mal offered the girl a slight smile. She knew exactly what Evie was thinking. It was no doubt a variety of scientific reasons for why sleep was not overrated.

“I kind of think that sleep is pretty important… I haven’t been getting much of it lately,” Jane mumbled, and Uma grinned widely as she looked over at the fairy from her position on the other side of Audrey.

“No doubt. Your butt’s been keeping you up at night, after all,” Uma pointed out, and Jane immediately shrank into her sleeping bag in pure mortification.

“Hey, you did walk right into that,” Uma told the girl, and Jane just sighed as she nodded slightly, knowing it was true.

Mal rolled her eyes at both of them and chose to concentrate her efforts upon looking at her phone. She inspected her text messages that she had been trying to send to her father, and she noticed that there were absolutely none sent or received outside of the conversation they had last week about their opinions on dogs as opposed to cats.

“Any connection?” Evie asked Mal quietly, interrupting Mal’s train of thought as the bluenette started to lean her head against Mal’s. Mal sniffed hard and stiffened at the persisting stench of skunk. Mal really didn’t want the rest of Evie near her.

But she truly couldn’t resist Evie. Mal loved Evie too much and wanted her close, but at the same time, Mal couldn’t stand the stink.

So, she just loosened up and decided that she’d let Evie’s head touch her.

“No. Not a thing. All we’ve got is a whole bunch of roam,” Mal expressed, letting Evie’s head bear the majority of the weight of Mal’s own. After a moment, Mal sighed deeply before turning off her phone, moving her head away from Evie’s to relax on the sleeping bag. Evie followed suit, and Mal looked at the rest of them from her reclined position.

“Well, Uma, you have fun on your stakeout or whatever. I’m hitting the sack,” Mal informed them, and Evie nodded easily, her eyes already drifting shut.

“Same. I need to rest my concussion, after all,” Audrey somewhat dramatically proclaimed, and Uma rolled her eyes. However, Mal could see the hidden concern and care in them as she shot a glance in Audrey’s direction.

“You don’t have no concussion,” Uma replied to her sassily, and Audrey simply chose to ignore her as she settled into her sleeping bag.

“Yeah, I think I’ll go to bed, too,” Jane agreed, and Uma grunted in response as she rolled over onto her side to look at her phone.

“Welp, when I catch a coon, y’all gonna miss the excitement. But whatever,” Uma told them, and they all just offered varying expressions of their lack of concern and ultimate doubting of Uma’s probability of success.

And so everything went quiet. And it all stayed quiet for quite some time.

That is, until there was a thud and the sound of Uma’s trap going off.

Uma had almost dozed off, but as soon as the noise started, Uma jerked awake, elbowing Audrey hard in the stomach in the midst of her surprise. Audrey coughed hard, waking up from her slumber as she glared at Uma.

“What the heck is wrong with you?! Are you _trying_ to kill me?!” Audrey cried, and Uma didn’t pay any attention to Audrey.

“Something’s in my trap!” Uma proclaimed, hurrying toward the flap, and Audrey furrowed her brow, immediately following Uma.

“Hang on a second!” Audrey cried as she tumbled out of the tent flap, accidentally tripping up Uma. Uma fell to the ground, and she growled as she got up from the dirt and reached for her stick in the blackness of the night. She could hardly see anything, and she more felt her way over to the trap.

As soon as she was in the nearby vicinity of whatever it was, she heard grunting. Uma wasted no time in swinging her large stick at the creature. As soon as she hit it, she could easily tell it was not a raccoon, but something much bigger.

“Good gosh, this ain’t no raccoon!” Uma cried, but she kept hitting the creature. After all, she had caught it now, and if she didn’t beat it, then it’d likely come after her.

“What is it, then?!” Audrey yelled, and Uma shook her head, beating the stuffing out of whatever it was.

“Might be the bear!” Uma proclaimed, stopping for only a moment.

“Really?!” Audrey questioned in shock.

“I don’t know!” Uma shot back, and it dawned on Audrey that Uma wasn’t hitting this thing she had caught. And Audrey didn’t want to get on this big thing’s bad side while it was alive still.

“What are you doing?! Hit it! HIT IT!!!” Audrey commanded, and Uma started smacking the creature again. It grunted hard and hacked, and she kept hitting it.

In the midst of this excitement, the two managed to wake up Evie, and her eyes shot open as she took in the sounds. She listened closely and she immediately knew Uma had caught something in her trap.

However, as she listened, she realized that the thing seemed to be making sounds that were not quite animal noises. Evie’s eyes widened as a particular thought occurred to her.

She turned to Mal in terror, swiftly shaking at her best friend’s shoulders.

“Mal, wake up! Get up! C’mon!” Evie whisper-yelled as she tried to get Mal’s attention in the midst of her fear.

Mal’s eyes barely cracked open, and her first instinct was to slap Evie’s hands away. So she did.

“Darn it, M, this is not the time for your persnickety hatred of getting woke up! We’ve got a huge problem!” Evie cried, shaking Mal more, and Mal grunted in response. Evie sighed deeply.

“Mal, I’m going to hug you. And I smell like a skunk,” Evie informed her quickly, and Mal immediately pulled out of her sleepy stupor, her eyes tired yet alert as she stared at the other girl.

“What the heck?! Don’t do that?! What’s wrong?” Mal questioned, and Evie couldn’t even relish her relief as a result of Mal’s awakening in the midst of her pure fear.

“Uma caught something in her trap!” Evie declared. Mal just stared at the girl for a long moment, shifting her gaze for just a moment in the general direction that the racket was coming from. She then looked back to Evie and raised her eyebrows, looking down as she started to lie down again.

“Well, good for her,” Mal replied, and Evie grabbed her arm again, and Mal jerked a little.

“Mal!”

“Why do you keep grabbing me?! You’re getting skunk on me!” Mal cried, and Evie shook her head swiftly as she let Mal go hesitantly, shooting a glance behind her as she listened to Uma keep hitting the thing outside.

“No, it’s super important! I don’t think she’s hitting a raccoon!” Evie proclaimed, and Mal furrowed her brow as she looked at Evie strangely.

“What do you mean she’s not hitting a---”

“I think she’s got Jimbo!” Evie proclaimed, and Mal froze as she stared at Evie as if she had lost her mind altogether.

“Evie. Seriously?”

“Please help!” Evie pleaded. Mal groaned before rolling over and grabbing her phone.

“The things I do for you,” Mal muttered under her breath, silently taking in the sight of Jane laying there in her sleeping bag in terror as she looked around with wide eyes.

Mal rolled her eyes and started out of the tent, Evie close behind her.

“Hit it harder, Uma, hit it harder!” Audrey egged Uma on almost insanely as Mal got out of the tent. She stood up, messing with her flashlight settings and tapping the icon to turn it on. As soon as she had it switched on, she headed over to the scene of the excitement. Evie was close behind her, and Mal could tell that it was all Evie could do not to grab on as she was so used to doing.

“Ha! I think I’m killing it!”

“What in the heck are you two doing?!” Mal demanded, and the two froze as they stared at Mal with wide eyes. Mal squinted as she turned her flashlight upon their prey.

To her utmost surprise, she spotted something that she had never expected to see.

“Dad?!”

There before her was Hades the god of the Underworld hanging upside down from a tree with an astoundingly blue bra somehow wrapped around his head. He just groaned in response to his daughter, and Mal gaped at him in shock.

“Oh… Hey, Dad!” Uma greeted, grinning widely as she pulled the bra off of his head to expose his face. His eyes were narrowed, and he glared at her in something between irritation and intense pain.

“Hello, Ursula Junior,” he returned, his voice sounding more like a wheeze, and Uma just chuckled as she stepped back away from him, chucking the bra somewhere behind her on the ground. Evie wasted no time in scuttling over to grab the thing.

As soon as Evie did, she retreated behind a tree to put it back on.

“Oh, my gosh, Hades, I’m so sorry!” Audrey yelped, jumping back as she stared in horror.

“It was Uma. Uma did this. It’s all her fault,” Audrey blamed swiftly, pointing at the pirate captain. He looked at Uma, completely unsurprised, and she glared at Audrey.

“What the---excuse me?! Who was right at my ear shouting, ‘Hit it harder!?’” Uma demanded, and Mal rolled her eyes.

“Besides, he’s alright. Aren’t ya, Dad?” Uma questioned, and tapped his stomach lightly with the stick.

“Please stop doing that!” he coughed, and Uma grinned, looking at Mal winningly. Mal growled under her breath.

“Uma, just get him down,” Mal commanded. Uma shrugged, withdrawing one of her many pocketknives and leaning up. Before Mal could stop her, she swiftly cut a vine, and Hades crashed onto the ground.

“Ouch,” he spoke, his voice strained. Mal glared at Uma, and the pirate chuckled a bit.

“Dad, what are you doing here?” Mal questioned as she leaned down and offered him a hand so he could sit up. He took it and she pulled him upright so he could speak to her a bit better while he relaxed.

“I came to check on you girls,” Hades expressed, and she involuntarily felt a surge of fondness. It meant a lot to her that he was willing to come all the way out here just to find them. Hades then narrowed his eyes and looked over at Uma. “But it seems like you five are just fine.”

“Hey, what can I say? I was after trash pandas and I got a trash papa,” Uma quipped with a laugh. Hades didn’t find this funny in the least and turned his attention to Mal instead.

“Why didn’t you text?” he questioned, and Mal sighed, turning on her phone and showing him the connectivity.

“It’s been on roam the whole time we’ve been here,” Mal explained, and he furrowed his brow in confusion.

“Well, why didn’t you tell it to come back?” he questioned, and for a long moment Mal honestly couldn’t tell if he was joking or not. After a moment, he cracked a wide grin, and she groaned, trying to hide her giant smile.

“That was terrible,” she chuckled slightly, enjoying the joke despite her verbal response. He pointed at her slyly.

“But it was good enough for you to laugh,” he acknowledged, and Mal shrugged.

“Umm… Is it safe? Or is he going to kill Uma and Audrey?” Jane hesitantly called, and Mal almost laughed out loud from her place kneeled next to her father.

“Yeah, it’s all good,” Mal replied, and Jane came out of the tent, heading over to the three other girls and the god.

“And I don’t kill. I reap their souls. It’s a big difference,” Hades proclaimed somewhat indignantly as he huffed a bit.

“How is that exactly?” Uma asked with a raise of her eyebrow. Hades just glared at her, but ultimately ignored her sarcasm.

At that time, Evie came out from behind the tree to rejoin them.

Mal grinned at her best friend, and Evie returned it easily. Mal could very clearly tell that Evie felt tons better since she put her bra back on. She just seemed infinitely more cheerful and comfortable.

“Sapphire! I was wondering where you had gotten off to. Also, was that bra strapped across my face yours?” Hades questioned, and Evie practically glowed red as she looked at the god. He placed a hand aside his mouth and stage-whispered to the girl.

“Does everybody know you wear a thirty-six C?” he questioned, and Uma snorted in reply, enjoying his joke as she raised her eyebrows at the bluenette.

Evie crossed her arms over her chest defensively, and Mal chuckled under her breath, offering Evie a loving smile. Evie looked a bit grumpy for a moment before offering Mal one of her own.

“Dad, how did you get here?” Mal asked, and Uma grinned wickedly before answering Mal.

“Magically,” Uma told the faerie, wiggling her fingers for emphasis and Audrey rolled her eyes at Uma.

“Let me guess. A magical chariot? Or did he ride his now-tiny French Bulldog Cerberus?” Audrey questioned, and Uma shrugged, waggling her eyebrows at the princess.

“Well, actually it was much less exciting than that. I took one of the limos from Mal’s and Florian’s place,” he simply answered. Uma sighed, looking somewhat disappointed.

“I should’ve known. You are becoming an old man and all that stuff.”

“I’m not an old man. I’m immortal, Urchin,” Hades replied, and Uma narrowed her eyes.

“The name’s Uma. Learn it. Y’know, if it’s not too much for your immortalized old man brain to handle,” Uma told him, and Hades scrunched his nose at her. Mal sighed as she got up from Hades’s side.

“Well, why don’t we all go to bed? It’s like three o’clock in the morning,” Mal told them.

“Sounds good. I’ll sleep in the back of the limo,” Hades expressed, and the rest of the girls nodded. Mal reached out, holding her hand out for Hades to help him up. Evie extended her hand as well, and between both of the girls, they hoisted him to his feet.

As soon as he was upright, his eyes widened and he leaned back, looking around before finally gazing at the two girls before him.

“Aw, gross, what is that smell?! That’s worse than corpse stink!” he proclaimed in disgust. Mal just looked at Uma, Audrey and Jane, and all four of them cracked up laughing.

And Evie died of embarrassment.


	14. Packing Up for Home

Mal was standing out near the river bank, looking out over the water as she leaned against a tree, reveling in the beauty of the day and trying to brand the scenery in her mind so that she could have a good drawing reference when she next had a moment to settle with her sketch book when they got home.

After that night, all of the girls had decided, as a result of Hades’s not quite so secret worrying, to return home. The entire trip had been fun, and at times, dangerous, but they all decided that they were ready to go home, and that they had enough of roughing it outdoors.

Of course, Uma had claimed that she could have went for a few more days, but they all knew that wasn’t really true. Uma was already short on sleep and seemed to be losing her gusto for the outdoors.

Hades had already left for the castle once Mal had assured him that they would be okay and that they were right behind him once they gathered all of their things, and Uma and Audrey were already started on cleaning up some things.

Mal was going to go back and help them in just a few minutes. She just wanted to admire the scenery for a moment before they left. As much as the river scared her, she couldn’t help but admire it.

Mal almost was surprised when she felt a presence suddenly nearby her and was hit with the nearly nose-blinding smell of skunk. However, at the gentle hand that barely touched her wrist, she could easily tell it was Evie.

The smell of skunk was also a pretty good indicator.

“What’re you doing?” Evie asked quietly, leaning against the tree that Mal was and looking down at her best friend from her slightly taller position.

Mal smiled softly at Evie and shrugged slightly. It was all she could do not to lean against Evie as she would normally, but she used Evie’s terrible smell as an acute reminder of the reason she shouldn’t.

“I don’t know. Just… Looking at it all before we go, I guess,” Mal expressed, and Evie nodded easily, understanding immediately without further explanation. Of course, Mal knew Evie would understand her totally without any words at all. Evie and Mal were just perfectly on the same page in that manner.

“It’s beautiful, isn’t it?”

“Yeah. Even the water’s kind of beautiful,” Mal informed Evie. Evie smiled slightly, looking at Mal quietly before turning her gaze back to the water. Mal was silent for a moment before she added onto her statement.

“Well, you know, once you get past the entire intense childhood trauma part of things, but who’s really affected by that?” Mal questioned, and Evie snorted, laughing at Mal. Mal grinned victoriously, pleased that she had drawn a laugh from her best friend.

“Yeah. Childhood trauma’s so overrated,” Evie added, bantering with Mal, and Mal grinned, moving her head in an agreeing motion.

“I know, right?” They both laughed before quieting down a bit. Evie sighed slightly, and Mal raised an eyebrow, looking at her and silently coaxing Evie to speak her thoughts.

“I’m going to kind of miss it,” Evie admitted, and Mal smiled lopsidedly at the other girl, taking in her profile.

“Even though you got sprayed by the nastiest animal on Earth?” Mal asked, and Evie chuckled under her breath.

“Yes. Even though that happened,” Evie agreed, and Mal nodded, knowing what Evie meant. Mal might even miss this place at some point in the future. Well, maybe after the entire ordeal with skunk, poison ivy rash, and a bee sting was long behind them.

They stood there quietly for a long while, just enjoying one another’s company.

However, Mal finally sighed, turning to Evie. She knew they had to get moving. They couldn’t just stay there all day looking at the scenery together, despite the fact that Mal would love that quality time with Evie.

“Well, I guess we should probably go help Audrey and Uma clean up,” Mal pointed out.

“Probably so,” Evie agreed, albeit disappointedly.

“I would stay here longer, but I really doubt Jane’s helping them,” Mal told her as they started back to the campsite through the bushes.

“Yeah, you’re right. She’s probably behind a tree scratching her behind.”

“Yeah, at your advice,” Mal teased, and Evie nudged her gently, playfully reprimanding her slightly for her words.

Soon, they entered the clearing where the camping site was. As soon as they got there, they could hear Audrey’s complaints.

“I stink, Uma!” Audrey proclaimed, following the pirate as Uma hauled the cooler toward the back of Evie’s vehicle.

“It took you this long to figure it out?” Uma questioned, rolling her eyes at the princess as she tried to squeeze the cooler in among the other luggage.

Mal and Evie shared a fond glance as they took in the two’s constant banter and butting of heads, and they noticed that the tent was still pitched. They sighed slightly, bending down and deciding to start work on getting it put away.

“Ugh, no! I smell horrible!” Audrey exclaimed, and Uma grinned wickedly as she looked back at the princess.

“Once again, it took you this long to---”

“NO! I smell stinky like you!” Audrey accusingly pointed at Uma, and the pirate pursed her lips in an expression of mock perplex.

“Huh. I don’t know how that is,” Uma spoke aloud, truthfully not really caring as she passed the princess and headed toward Mal and Evie where they were working on getting the tent taken apart. Jane was still gone, no doubt somewhere behind a tree still.

“You must be rubbing your stench on me at night!” Audrey claimed, and Uma huffed in something between amusement and slight irritation.

“Well, you must be hugging up on me at night,” Uma shot back easily as she accompanied the other girls.

“I would never---”

“I woke up at night, and I saw her,” Jane piped up from behind a tree, and Uma couldn’t help but give herself a mental pat on the back for guessing Jane’s whereabouts correctly.

“Shut up, Jane,” Audrey simply replied, and Jane quieted down. Uma grinned victoriously.

“See?” Uma questioned, and Audrey just glared at Uma, finding that she had no choice but to accept that the whole thing was her fault. Despite how accidental it may have been.

“Look, I grab things in my sleep, okay?!” Audrey defensively proclaimed.

“It’s okay, Audrey, I stink like a skunk because Evie grabs me at night. Of course, I think Evie grabs me during most of the day, too,” Mal thoughtfully pointed out as she yanked at part of the tent.

“You just don’t know how it feels, Mal, to need and want a bath with every fiber of your being,” Audrey informed the faerie somewhat dramatically, and Evie smiled knowingly as she nudged Mal’s shoulder gently.

“M knows. In fact, she really wants a bath right now. I daresay even Uma wants one,” Evie acknowledged and Mal stopped her pulling on the part to listen to the conversation a bit more attentively.

“I do not. I could go three weeks without a bath, and still be living with myself just fine,” Uma bragged, and Audrey wrinkled her nose. Evie just grinned, not allowing Uma’s words to deter her.

“Why have you been going for swims so often, then?” Mal spoke up before Evie could, and Evie squeezed Mal’s arm affectionately.

“I like the water. Duh,” Uma responded easily, and Evie just gazed at her with a somewhat sly and smug expression. Mal simply chose to return to trying to take apart the tent. She grabbed onto that same piece that wouldn’t come apart, and she yanked it.

Uma raised an eyebrow as Mal pulled hard at that one part. Evie watched for a moment before grabbing on and assisting her. Uma started to open her mouth to offer instruction.

However, the tent suddenly popped apart and fell into multiple pieces. Both Mal and Evie had large eyes at this sudden development. After a long moment, they slowly looked at one another. Mal blinked, and they both couldn’t help but laugh at the entire ordeal.

“Yeah… I was going to say that it might not be a good idea to pull that,” Uma said, and Mal just rolled her eyes good-naturedly at the pirate as she started helping Evie stuff various tent parts into the bag. Uma knelt down and started to help them as well. Audrey huffed in irritation.

“I’m still not over the fact that you made me stink,” Audrey declared as she hesitantly bent down to start assisting them in their work.

“Apparently,” Uma deadpanned, gathering several pieces at a time.

“I knew I should’ve slept next to someone else,” Audrey spoke her thoughts aloud, and Uma just raised an eyebrow.

“Who else was there? Ol’ Smelly Skunk Genevieve or Freaky Fartin’ Mal?” Uma questioned, and the best friend pair glared at the pirate, silently expressing precisely how they felt about that nomenclature.

“Well, anybody else, honestly. That rotten funion-seaweed combo is bad enough on you, but on both of us? Gosh, I’m surprised that Mal and Evie don’t just fall over and die,” Audrey proclaimed, and Uma scoffed.

“Good grief, that doesn’t mean anything. Mal sits there and lets Evie get close while she stinks like a dang polecat and Evie’s said so herself that her nose has lost its senses as a result of Mal’s farting. Which I don’t doubt, but still,” Uma explained, and Evie almost laughed in reply.

“Actually, it’s just lost its ability to smell that one particular smell. I’m still getting strong whiffs of funion-seaweed,” Evie replied, muttering the last part more to Mal than to anyone, and Mal snorted. However, Uma jut grumbled under her breath.

Before too much longer, they had all of the tent pieces piled inside of the bag, and Uma and Mal were hauling it over to the back of the vehicle. They then dropped it down in the rear compartment. Mal reached for the trunk lid and paused before shutting it.

“Have we got everything?” Mal asked as she looked at Evie. Evie furrowed her brow, looking around as she considered the question.

Everything seemed to be in its proper place, and the campsite looked practically identical to its state before the girls stayed there except for the logs sitting around a fire pit. They thought they’d leave that there in case someone wanted to camp there again.

Evie turned to look at Mal once again.

“Yeah. I think we’ve got it all,” Evie confirmed, and Uma nodded. Audrey hummed in agreeance, and Mal wasted no time in shutting the back of the Jeep. They then all headed for their seats.

Evie and Mal both got into their places in the front of the vehicle, and Audrey slid in the backseat, followed by Uma. However, as soon as she was seated, she was acutely aware of the fact that she was not sitting next to Jane.

“Why is my bag separating me and Jane?” Audrey questioned after a moment of gazing at the giant hot pink thing that successfully kept Audrey from seeing any part of Jane.

“Oh, she asked for a barrier between her and you two because she was, and I quote, ‘terrified she would be brutally mauled,’” Mal informed them, not bothering to turn around as she looked out the windshield.

Evie and the rest of them gave one last look to the camping site, and with a collective sigh, Evie cranked the Jeep and headed off back down the road where they would eventually approach the gate.

They shared a lengthy silence until Audrey suddenly spoke up.

“Well… Uma,” Audrey started, and Uma raised an eyebrow, looking over at the princess. She silently cued the girl to continue in her statement. Audrey returned her gaze and with a somewhat painful expression, complied with the unspoken command.

“It really wasn’t _so_ terrible going out here and camping,” Audrey admitted. Uma gaped at the girl in shock for a moment before an enormous grin slowly spread across her face. Uma swiftly slung an arm around Audrey’s shoulders affectionately.

“I knew you’d come around.”

“Now, I’m not doing it again, but I didn’t mind this time so horribly. Overall, of course,” Audrey clarified, and Uma just chuckled, patting Audrey’s shoulder and giving her a squeeze before releasing her.

“I had a lot of fun,” Mal happily informed the lot of them, and Evie nodded in reply, smiling affectionately at her best friend. Mal considered reaching out her hand for a moment, weighing the consequences, but at the hopeful and adoring look on Evie’s face, she made the ultimate decision to do it. She moved her hand to Evie, and the bluenette wasted no time in grabbing it, using her other to steer Charlene.

“I really enjoyed it, too. And even though I’m going to have to send Charlene to the shop to get her interior cleaned, I would do it all over again,” Evie sweetly proclaimed.

“Of course, I always love these trips we have,” Evie added, and everyone agreed easily.

“Yeah. Believe it or not, I’ve come to actually enjoy intellectually outwitting Uma.”

“Uh-huh. If that’s true, then why is it that I have all the comebacks, and you sit there getting all flustered?” Uma questioned, and Audrey just narrowed her eyes, glaring at Uma. The pirate captain just grinned winningly, enjoying her small victory.

“I love spending time with you guys,” Evie expressed, and the other girls’ expressions softened as they gazed at Evie in the front seat. Evie looked at Mal affectionately.

“Me, too. It really does mean a lot to me,” Mal reciprocated, and Uma smiled.

“Yeah. It’s been really fun.”

“We should definitely do it again sometime. Just not camping or anything to do with the outdoors. At all,” Audrey expressed, and Uma just slyly looked at her.

“Huh. I could’ve sworn that you enjoyed getting stung and getting conked out cold. Heck, one of my most favorite parts of the trip was when you went unconscious--- it was the most peaceful thirty minutes of my life, let me tell you,” Uma claimed, and Mal and Evie just shared a knowing glance. They knew Uma had been not so secretly completely terrified and out of her mind with worry, but they chose not to bring that up.

“Well, that and Evie getting sprayed and Jane contracting itchy-butt. Whatcha think, Jane?” Uma questioned, grinning widely as she looked over in the direction of the giant hot pink bag.

There was a long moment of silence, and Uma raised an eyebrow, her smile fading slightly.

“Jane?” Uma questioned, and Audrey furrowed her brow, casting a glance at the bag. Uma stared at it for a long moment before her grin returned.

“Now don’t act like you can’t hear me,” Uma chuckled, folding her arms over her chest.

Once again, the pirate received no response. Audrey raised up a little and pulled the bag down a bit as she tried to see what was on the other side.

After a moment, her eyes went wide, and she turned back to look at the other girls.

“Evie! Turn around! We left Jane!!!”


	15. Happy Conclusions

“Hey, Audrey? Do you happen to have any of that perfume you wear?” Evie questioned suddenly as she drove down that familiar road leading back to Mal’s castle.

After they went back and got Jane, they headed back to the castle and, at Evie’s insistence, didn’t stop even once. Fortunately, nobody had to go to the bathroom yet, but their legs were certainly feeling cramped after riding for a while without any stretch breaks.

But now they were very close to home, and they were all so looking forward to arriving and enjoying the comforts that they were so accustomed to. However, they also well-remembered the boys and their camping trip that they were going to go on, and they knew they had to be on-guard because the boys would likely try to brag about their great endurance in the outdoors. And the girls couldn’t let the boys think that they bested the girls.

“Well, of course. But if you’re going to do what I think you’re going to do, then you’re going to need more than a whole bottle to cover that odor,” Audrey pointed out, and Evie furrowed her brow, considering it for a moment, but ultimately just shrugged.

“I’ll take my chances. Can I use it?” Evie questioned, and she soon felt the smooth glass of the bottle touching the skin on her arm. Casting a grateful glance back to Audrey, she took it carefully and handed it over to Mal.

“M, could you—”

“Of course, E,” Mal replied easily, starting to spray the scent on Evie. Uma coughed hard as she waved the scent away as it began to waft around the entire car. She held her nose tightly as she squinted.

“Aww, heck, that’s nasty! That’s just as loud as Audrey’s mouth!” Uma proclaimed loudly as she tried to keep the spray from getting into her nose. Audrey just glared at the pirate in offense, and Uma paid no attention to her.

Once Mal had emptied quite a bit of the bottle, she handed it back to Audrey.

“What do you think? Is it covered or do I need to spray more?”

“NO!!!” Uma immediately yelled in reply, and Audrey just scoffed in slight irritation. However, Uma did very hesitantly uncover her nose, but swiftly re-covered it.

“Man, that’s just… Phew!” Uma shook her head hard, snorting as she tried to rid herself of the stench that was pervading every inch of the car.

“I’d honestly prefer skunk over this!” Uma expressed, and Audrey furrowed her brow angrily, taking offense to the entire ordeal.

“Well, I think it covered the smell,” Evie announced, and they all nodded, some of them with an exceedingly greater amount of enthusiasm.

And it was just in time, too, because they were now driving up in front of the castle. To both their happiness and their chagrin, the boys were all gathered outside waiting on them. As soon as they caught sight of Evie’s Jeep, they all straightened and started to wave. Even Hades was waiting on them, and he had a fond smile on his face as he watched the Jeep approach.

“Now, remember. We didn’t get sprayed by a skunk, contract a poison ivy rash, get a bee sting, or anything else that makes us look less than tough. Right?” Uma questioned, her eyes watering just a bit from the aroma as they were slowing down and starting to park. All of them expressed varying forms of agreement, and Uma nodded resolutely.

“Good. Now let’s see our guys and find out how they did with camping by the Enchanted Lake,” Uma told them, unable to keep from laughing at the last part of her statement as Evie turned off the ignition. The other girls giggled, and with a shared glance, they all exited the vehicle.

As soon as Evie, Audrey, and Uma exited on the side that the boys were on, Jay had grabbed Audrey and pulled him to her, locking lips with her before he could even get a look at her face. She let out a small squeak of surprise but wasted no time in grabbing him and returning the kiss wholly.

Harry ambled over to Uma, looking at her with his head lowered and a giant grin building on his face. Uma wasted no time in grabbing his collar and kissing him swiftly. After a moment, she released him, noticing Gil was waiting anxiously nearby. Uma rolled her eyes, grabbing Gil’s shoulder fondly and squeezing him.

Mal and Jane came around the vehicle, and Ben smiled widely at Mal as he stepped a bit closer with a smile. She returned it softly, and kissed him gently, laying a hand on his cheek before letting go of him. Hades came over to her and opened his arms. She grinned and wasted no time in hugging him carefully.

“Hey, I was worried that I might have to come back and get you guys,” he mumbled, and Mal rolled her eyes, letting go of him and lightly smacking him. He laughed, and she smirked in a simple reply.

Jane gazed at Carlos with wide eyes, and he stared back at her similarly. After a long moment, they both laughed slightly, not quite so sure what to do. However, Carlos then hesitantly stepped forward and took Jane’s face in his hands. Jane gazed at him with wide eyes, all of her attention solely on him, and he looked at her questioningly. She barely breathed an agreement, and he leaned in carefully, kissing the girl for the second time. It was short and sweet, but it made both of them blush hotly when they broke away.

As soon as Jay released Audrey’s lips from his own, he jumped back, covering his nose.

“Whew! You must’ve fell in the perfume bottle again, huh?” he asked, and Uma cracked up laughing, turning away from her boys to enjoy the situation nearby her. Audrey growled at Uma, but as soon as she caught up with the implications behind his statement, she gaped at Jay with wide eyes.

“Again?! What’s that supposed to---”

“And what happened to your head?!” Jay questioned, and Audrey opened her mouth to reply.

“I got a little too rough with her. We were horsing around, and I got a little out of hand,” Uma volunteered, trying to provide a quick explanation for the ordeal. Audrey nodded, deciding to go with Uma’s explanation. Jay looked at her somewhat strangely, and Evie knew that she needed to get his mind off that situation quickly.

“And the perfume was me,” Evie informed him immediately. Jay raised his eyebrows, and he looked at Carlos in surprise as he considered Evie’s reply.

“Wow, I never thought you’d use that,” Carlos pointed out from his place near Jane.

“Yeah, especially after ranting about how much you hated that smell,” Jay added, covering his nose.

“I just thought I’d try something different,” Evie attempted to cover the truth, and Mal glanced at her best friend from her place right next to the girl.

Hades just quirked one eyebrow behind the boys’ backs, knowing the truth behind the sudden perfume use but choosing to let the girls get away with the lie. After all, he strongly suspected that the boys were going to start trying to boast, and he quite honestly wanted the girls to win this round of proving toughness.

Audrey’s turned to Evie, staring at her in shock. Evie mirrored Audrey’s look, trying to look as innocent as possible. Mal almost wanted to laugh, but she held it back for Evie’s sake.

“What?! You hate it?! I knew you thought it was weird, but I didn’t know you hated it!” Audrey exclaimed, and Evie backed away just barely, bumping into Mal. Mal reached her hands up, taking Evie’s elbows in her hand gently as she tried to steady her.

“No, I don’t hate it! It’s just different---”

“Hate it is an understatement. She said that’s the filthiest thing she’s ever smelled, and she’s surprised people in the morgue don’t put that under their noses instead of vanilla extract,” Carlos pointed out.

“And she said the only reason that they didn’t put that under their noses instead of vanilla extract was because vanilla actually smelled better than the corpses,” Jay added to that statement, and Audrey was completely baffled.

“I personally think the perfume smells even worse than the corpses,” Uma threw in her opinion, and Audrey glared at Carlos, Jay, Evie, and Uma, shifting her gaze between the members of the group.

“Well, gosh! How many of you hate my perfume?!” Audrey demanded. Uma’s hand went up immediately, shortly thereafter followed by Jay and Gil--- the latter of which was attempting to please his comrades--- and then Evie barely raised a finger.

“But I don’t exactly hate it,” Evie clarified, attempting to make the impact at least a bit better.

Jane started to raise her hand, but Audrey swiftly slapped it down.

“Don’t you even dare, Jane,” Audrey commanded, and Jane didn’t try to raise her hand again.

“Ben? What do you think?” Audrey questioned, and Ben straightened a bit, looking into the eyes of his ex-girlfriend and childhood friend. He gulped hard, not wanting to tell her truth, and deciding ultimately to go with the answer he knew she’d want to hear.

“Umm… It’s great. It’s been great ever since we were twelve years old when you first started wearing it,” Ben lied, putting on a big grin as he tried to make her believe it. Mal and Evie both just looked at him, completely unimpressed at his chicken actions. He just glanced at them sheepishly.

Audrey just huffed, crossing her arms over her chest as she huffily looked away from the group.

“But anyways! How was your trip?” Ben spoke up, trying to move away from the awkwardness of the situation. Evie, Mal, Uma, and Jane wasted no time in putting on giant smiles.

“It was really good!” Evie expressed her opinion immediately, keeping a big smile in hopes that the boys wouldn’t suspect anything.

“Yeah. We ran into some rain while we were out there, but we stuck it out,” Uma told them, holding up an arm and playfully taking on the Rosie the Riveter pose.

“And we even came across a bear that tried to get on Evie’s Jeep where she parked it,” Jane piped up helpfully, and Mal nodded.

“Yeah, and Evie scared it away. She’s tough as nails when it comes to her car,” Mal bragged just a bit, looking at Evie adoringly, and Evie’s chest puffed a little with the praise. Uma rolled her eyes a bit, not particularly impressed with Mal’s extreme praise of the bluenette.

“Other than that, it went really well, I think,” Evie said, and the other girls nodded easily.

“How was your time at the Enchanted Lake?” Audrey suddenly spoke up, looking at the boys with the barest hint of something dangerous in her gaze. Uma raised an eyebrow, eager to see how this story went.

The boys shared a glance quickly before beginning their tale. Hades rolled his eyes as he watched the group.

“Oh, it was really dangerous,” Jay started, and Harry nodded, stepping up as he continued.

“Yeah, we ran into a bear an’ everythin’, jus’ like ye all did,” Harry claimed.

“Ol’ Hairball had his hook to its throat, and I was pinning it down,” Jay proclaimed boldly, and Harry gave him a slight unhappy glance for the nickname, but he largely ignored that part in favor of supporting Jay’s story.

“Me and Ben were helping hold it down,” Carlos added, holding his hands out as if he were in the act of pushing the animal in submission.

“And then he sliced its throat. Easy,” Jay told them. Audrey shared a skeptical glance with Uma, and the boys seemed to realize that they needed to add more and that the girls weren’t as impressed as they hoped for.

“And we ran into rain, too,” Carlos started, and Ben leapt at the opportunity to put in his viewpoint.

“Yeah, it was pouring down cats and dogs,” Ben added, and Harry smirked.

“But we stayed out there without a tent,” Harry boasted, straightening to his full height as he showcased that somewhat maniacal grin.

“For sure,” Carlos agreed, nodding his head enthusiastically.

“So, we handled the camping trip just fine, girls, if that was what you were asking,” Jay informed them. The girls just watched the boys quietly for a moment, and Gil looked at them all in complete confusion. He looked at Jay and Harry cluelessly.

“Well, huh…. I must have been on a different camping trip or something, because that’s not how I remember it at all!” Gil spoke up, and they all looked at the boy.

“We all ran back to the castle when it rained and spent the night inside. Remember, guys? And we watched Jumanji. Remember?” Gil explained, and the girls held back the smiles that were attempting to come onto their faces.

“And there were no bears! We saw a squirrel, though, and when it got too close, Ben ran and screamed like a little girl. And we saw a spider, too! Both Jay and Harry were terrified,” Gil told on the boys in that sweet, innocent, completely clueless manner.

The boys glared at Gil like they were going to kill him, and Uma finally started to laugh. As soon as she did, the rest of the girls joined in.

After a moment, Audrey looked over at Uma, smiling at the pirate fondly. Uma looked back at her with a smile, and Audrey spoke her thoughts aloud.

“Well, it looks like we really did rough it.”


End file.
